Asset managers in the market: my 2026 ranking

2026-07-13 · By Lubin Danilo, founder of Lubin Investment

Ameriprise Financial: see the full analysis on Lubin Investment

Between Ameriprise, Northern Trust and Blackstone, the most famous is neither the best rated nor the cheapest. In my ranking, Ameriprise comes first with the lowest valuation, while Blackstone, the sector star, is the most expensive and the lowest rated. Fame tells you nothing about quality.

A strong brand tells you nothing about quality

Ask around: of Ameriprise, Northern Trust and Blackstone, which is the strongest? Most people will say Blackstone, because that is the name in the headlines, the one behind the mega funds and the splashy buyouts. Yet when I run these three through my grid, the opposite shows up: the one the public knows least, Ameriprise, earns the highest score and carries the lowest valuation. The most famous, Blackstone, is the most expensive and the lowest rated.

On paper the three do a similar job, managing other people's money, but in very different ways. Ameriprise advises individuals on their wealth and sells them insurance and annuity products under the RiverSource brand, through a network of more than 10,000 advisors. Northern Trust is a custody bank: it holds and administers the assets of large institutional clients, pension funds, foundations and wealthy families. Blackstone is the world's largest alternative asset manager, specialized in private equity, real estate and private credit.

My point here is simple: a strong brand, the real quality of a business and the price you pay in the market are three separate things that do not move together. We often confuse them. Separating what each company actually does, what it is worth, and what the market is asking for it is the heart of my method.

How I score an asset manager

Before comparing, I set the rules. I give each company a score out of 10 that judges one thing only: the quality of the business, regardless of its price. A high score means the company generates a lot of cash, does so with little capital, and returns that cash to shareholders. Price is judged separately: an excellent company can be a bad buy if it is too expensive, and the reverse is true too.

Two measures come up constantly. The first, the free cash flow margin, is the cash that actually stays in the till once every bill is paid, as a share of revenue: if a company takes in 100 and 40 of free cash is left, its margin is 40%. The second, return on capital, measures how much cash the business produces for every dollar it ties up in its operations; the higher it is, the more efficient the machine. I add the pace of buybacks: when a company buys back its own shares, fewer remain, so each surviving share owns a bigger slice of the pie.

Finally, valuation. I read it in years of cash: a company valued at 7 times its free cash flow means you are paying today the equivalent of 7 years of that cash. The lower the number, the cheaper the stock. You can find all of these measures for any company in my screener. Let us go through them one by one.

Ameriprise: the advisor still mistaken for an insurer

Ameriprise earns the highest score of my trio, 9 out of 10, and by far the lowest valuation. Its business is unglamorous but formidably profitable: guiding individuals over time, managing their savings, selling them annuities and insurance. Its free cash flow margin reaches 34.9% of revenue and its return on capital climbs to 64.9%, a level very few companies reach. On top of that it buys back its shares at a pace of 4.9% per year, which mechanically concentrates value on the remaining shareholders.

What makes Ameriprise misunderstood is its apparent debt, 4.54 times its annual cash, which looks high. But a large part of it is not real debt. An insurer collects its clients' premiums today and will only pay the annuities or claims much later, sometimes decades out. The regulator therefore forces it to set aside reserves against those future commitments. On the books, these reserves look like debt, but they are mostly client money parked until it comes due, not borrowings that threaten the company. Confusing the two makes Ameriprise look more fragile than it is.

The recent trajectory confirms the shift of the model toward advice. In the first quarter of 2026, Ameriprise administered or managed $1.7 trillion in assets, up 12% year over year. The revenue generated by each advisor hit a record $1.2 million, up 10%, and operating revenues rose 11%. Above all, the assets held in fee-based accounts, the accounts where the client pays a recurring fee on their holdings rather than per transaction, jumped 16% to $664 billion. That is the sign of a recurring-fee machine, not a plain insurer.

Northern Trust: the quiet vault of the institutions

Northern Trust, rated 8 out of 10, does a job the public never sees: asset custody. When a pension fund or a foundation holds thousands of securities, it needs a trusted third party to keep them, administer them, collect the dividends and keep the books. That is what Northern Trust does, for a tiny fee charged on gigantic amounts. Its free cash flow margin reaches 44%, higher than Ameriprise's, and its cash per share has jumped 48.4% over the recent period.

Here again, one figure frightens people wrongly: net debt of 64.6 times annual cash. In reality, that is the normal structure of a bank. When a client deposits money at Northern Trust, that deposit is, on the books, a debt: it is money the bank owes its client and will have to give back. A healthy bank therefore has, by construction, colossal deposit amounts on the liability side of its balance sheet. That is not a sign of fragility, it is the business itself. Judging a deposit bank by its gross debt makes no sense.

What makes Northern Trust precious is the rarity of its asset. In June 2025, BNY, the world's largest custodian, approached Northern Trust about a combination, and the two chief executives spoke. A combined entity would have exceeded $70 trillion in assets under custody. Northern Trust said it intended to stay independent, but the episode revealed something important: when the sector's number one comes knocking, it is because your business is hard to replicate. This kind of infrastructure is not built in a few years.

Blackstone: the expensive star of private equity

Blackstone is the name everyone knows, and yet it is my lowest score of the trio, 6 out of 10. It is the world's largest alternative asset manager: it raises funds from investors to buy companies and real estate and to lend to businesses. Its classic model is the 2 and 20: the manager takes about a 2% management fee per year on the money entrusted to it, then pockets a share of the gains, often 20%, once a minimum return has been cleared. That share of the gains has a name, carried interest, and the minimum return to clear before earning it is called the hurdle.

The problem with carried interest is that it is cyclical. It depends on the gains realized when the funds sell their assets, so on the markets. Over the past period, Blackstone's revenues fell 3.9% per year and the cash it generated fell 8.6% per year, with costs rising faster than income. A fee machine that seizes up when the cycle turns is exactly what my score penalizes: I prefer recurring, predictable cash over spectacular but erratic gains.

The important nuance is that Blackstone is transforming. In the first quarter of 2026, the company rebounded sharply: its assets hit a record $1.3 trillion, up 12% year over year; its recurring fees, what the industry calls Fee Related Earnings, meaning the income from management fees alone, excluding gains, rose 23%; and its fee revenues rose 20%. Above all, Blackstone is pushing permanent capital: funds whose money does not have to be returned on a fixed date. At the end of March 2026, this permanent capital reached $539.7 billion, close to 48% of the fee-earning assets. The higher that share climbs, the more recurring the revenues become and the less the company depends on the cycle.

Price, side by side

The quality ladder is clear, but what does each one cost? This is where the story turns on its head. Here are the three side by side, then my verdict on each price, in three steps: where the valuation sits, why the market pays it that way, and whether it is justified.

Company	Score out of 10	Valuation (years of cash)	Premium or discount	The market's verdict
Ameriprise (AMP)	9	7.3	Discount of about 36%	Wrongly filed as an insurer
Northern Trust (NTRS)	8	15.2	Close to fair value	Rare strategic asset
Blackstone (BX)	6	32.7	Premium of about 63%	Paying up for the brand

Let us start with the most striking one. Ameriprise is valued at 7.3 times its cash, a discount of about 36%, meaning a price well below what you would pay for that kind of quality. Why so low? Because the market still files it under 'insurer', a sector it pays little for, wary of balance sheets loaded with reserves and of sensitivity to interest rates. My verdict: this discount is far too wide. The market has not recognized Ameriprise's transformation into a recurring advice-fee machine; it keeps judging it on an old model.

Northern Trust is valued at 15.2 times its cash, a level I find reasonable, neither a gift nor a trap. The cause is clear: BNY's approach in 2025 shone a light on the rare strategic value of the asset and put a kind of floor under the price. When an asset is coveted by the sector leader, the market is reluctant to give it away. My verdict: the price is fair. You will not find Ameriprise's discount here, but you are paying for defensive infrastructure that is hard to replicate.

Blackstone, finally, is valued at 32.7 times its cash, a premium of about 63%: by far the most expensive of the trio, for the lowest score. The market is paying here for the brand, the fundraising power and the shift toward permanent capital that makes revenues more recurring. My verdict is nuanced: the premium is partly deserved, because Blackstone really is reducing its dependence on the cycle, but 32.7 times cash leaves no margin of safety. Carried interest stays cyclical, and at this price the slightest market disappointment can hurt.

Moat, management and risks: what I really look at

A score does not replace judgment on the moat, the word for the ditch that protects a company from its rivals, like the water around a castle. All three have one, but of a different nature. Ameriprise holds its clients through the long-term relationship with its advisors: changing wealth advisors is a hassle, so the assets stay. Northern Trust holds its clients through infrastructure and trust: you do not hand custody of billions to a newcomer. Blackstone holds its clients through size and reputation, which let it raise funds no one else could raise.

On capital allocation, all three return money to shareholders, but Ameriprise stands out for the discipline of its steady buybacks. The risks are not the same. Ameriprise stays sensitive to markets and rates through its insurance business. Northern Trust depends on large institutional clients and on the pressure on custody fees. Blackstone carries the most visible risk: its dependence on the market cycle and the weight of a valuation that assumes everything keeps going well.

The trade-off comes down to this. With Ameriprise, you get the best quality at the best price, but you must accept that the market takes time to change its mind. With Northern Trust, you pay a fair price for a defensive, coveted asset, with little discount to hope for. With Blackstone, you buy the best growth story of the trio, but you pay full price, with no net. Three profiles, three ways of saying that brand, quality and price are never the same thing.

If you want to dig in, I laid out the most interesting case of the trio in my analysis of Ameriprise, and you can run any other asset manager through the same grid with my analyzer. This is exactly what I wanted to be able to do for every company I look at, so I built it.

Key takeaways

In my ranking, the company the public knows least, Ameriprise, earns the highest score and the lowest valuation; the most famous, Blackstone, is the most expensive and the lowest rated.
Ameriprise (scored 9 out of 10, valued at 7.3 times its cash) is still judged as an insurer even though it has become a recurring advice-fee machine: a discount of about 36% that I consider excessive.
Northern Trust (scored 8 out of 10, valued at 15.2 times its cash) shows a fair price: BNY's 2025 approach revealed the strategic rarity of its custody business.
Blackstone (scored 6 out of 10, valued at 32.7 times its cash) partly deserves its premium as it reduces its dependence on the cycle through permanent capital, but at this valuation there is no margin of safety.
The lesson: a debt that is not really one (insurance reserves, bank deposits) and a strong brand can cloud your judgment. Look at the cash, its regularity and the price you pay.

FAQ

Why does Ameriprise score higher than Blackstone even though it is less famous?

Because my score judges the quality of the business, not the fame. Ameriprise generates abundant, steady cash with a 64.9% return on capital, while Blackstone saw its revenues and cash fall over the past period, with results that depend more on the market cycle.

Is the debt of Ameriprise and Northern Trust dangerous?

No, not in their case. At Ameriprise, much of it is insurance reserves required by the regulator, client money locked up until annuities are paid later. At Northern Trust, it is deposits, meaning money the bank owes its clients. In both cases, it is the normal structure of the business.

What happened between BNY and Northern Trust?

In June 2025, BNY, the world's largest custodian, approached Northern Trust about a combination, and the two chief executives spoke. A combined entity would have exceeded $70 trillion in assets under custody. Northern Trust said it intended to stay independent.

Is Blackstone too expensive to buy?

At 32.7 times its cash, it offers the thinnest margin of safety of the trio. Its shift toward permanent capital, $539.7 billion at the end of March 2026, makes its revenues more recurring and justifies part of the premium. But at this price, a market disappointment can hurt, because carried interest stays cyclical.

About the author

Written by Lubin Danilo, founder of Lubin Investment. A self-taught individual investor, I find fundamental analysis fascinating, and it has delivered excellent results. For three years now, my performance has beaten the S&P 500. But analyzing every stock took too much time: sites with incomplete data, calculation methods and criteria never aligned with mine. And spotting the best stocks was just as time-consuming, even with my own well-defined checklist. So I put my software development background to work to build this software, base my investment strategy on its results, and share it with people who share the same passion as me. It judges a company's quality and its price separately, using criteria drawn from the financial literature (Warren Buffett, Michael Mauboussin, Aswath Damodaran).