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Morningstar, Inc.
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=== ''Asset management'' === Asset management firms manufacture financial products and manage and distribute investment portfolios. This customer group includes individuals involved in sales, marketing, product development, business intelligence, and distribution, as well as investment management (often referred to as the “buy side”), which includes portfolio management and research. Morningstar's asset management offerings help companies connect with their clients because of Morningstar’s strong brand presence with both financial advisors and individual investors. Morningstar offers a global reach and have earned investors’ trust in its unbiased approach, investor-centric mission, and thought leadership. The key products it offers for asset management firms include Morningstar Direct, Morningstar Data, and Morningstar Indexes. For the buy side, key products include Morningstar Research, DBRS Morningstar, Morningstar Data, Morningstar Direct, and Sustainalytics. ==== ''Fixed income security issuers, arrangers, and investors'' ==== DBRS Morningstar typically issues credit ratings in response to requests from issuers, intermediaries, or investors. DBRS Morningstar credit ratings are requested for corporate short and long-term fixed income obligations, sovereign debt, single project financings and structured finance programs, including securitizations of receivables, such as auto loans, credit cards, residential real estate loans and commercial real estate loans. In addition, claims-paying-ability credit ratings are issued for life, property/casualty, financial guaranty, title, and mortgage insurance companies. DBRS Morningstar's staff analyses the factors to assess the credit worthiness of an issuer or a security and summarizes the rationale for the credit ratings. DBRS Morningstar credit ratings are assigned and reviewed by a credit rating committee composed of senior credit rating analysts and analytical managers. DBRS Morningstar typically monitors its credit ratings at appropriate intervals depending on the type of the credit rating. Morningstar estimates that the $10 billion global ratings market has grown at a 6.3% compound annual growth rate over the past decade, supported by various secular trends. A continuing low-interest-rate environment supports corporate borrowings, and favourable spreads support high-yield and structured finance bond issuance. Credit markets continue to evolve and use structured products as a key avenue for capital. Overall demand for structured products by institutional investors, including banks in the U.S. and Europe, remains high. As of December 31, 2021, Morningstar served approximately 3,000 issuers of debt. ==== ''Private market/venture capital investors'' ==== PitchBook covers the full lifecycle of venture capital, private equity, and merger and acquisition (M&A) activities, including the limited partners, investment funds, and service providers involved. Morningstar's main product for this customer group is the PitchBook Platform, an all-in-one research and analysis workstation that gives clients the ability to access data, discover new connections, and conduct research on potential investment opportunities. An Excel plug-in and mobile capabilities are included with the platform license, and Morningstar public equity research can also be delivered through the platform. As of December 31, 2021, Morningstar served over 8,600 clients, including investment and research firms, venture capital and private equity firms, investment banks, limited partners, lenders, law firms, and accounting firms. It also served corporate development teams at firms across industry sectors. ==== ''Workplace/retirement'' ==== In the U.S., 401(k) retirement plans and other types of defined-contribution (DC) plans, such as 403(b) plans and the Thrift Savings Plan, are the dominant retirement plan offered by employers. According to the Investment Company Institute, there were $10.4 trillion in assets in DC plans at end of the third quarter of 2021, compared to $3.7 trillion in private-sector defined benefit (DB) plans and $7.6 trillion in government DB plans. Although DC plans help millions of workers in the U.S. save for retirement, the industry continues to struggle to boost employee savings rates, to make it easier for companies to offer retirement plans, and to increase access to high-quality investment line-ups. Morningstar believes that a significant market exists for offerings, such as its managed retirement accounts offering, that are designed to address these shortcomings by providing personalized advice that helps individuals build assets for retirement and beyond. Currently, Morningstar's focus is the U.S. market, because it continues to demonstrate healthy growth. In addition, many of its offerings are not easily adapted to foreign markets due to significant differences in regulatory frameworks that govern retirement saving and investing. Morningstar's core retirement products (managed retirement accounts, fiduciary services, and custom models) primarily reach individual investors through employers (plan sponsors) that offer DC plans for their employees. As of December 31, 2021, Morningstar served 71 retirement service providers and registered investment advisors (RIAs), representing about 297,000 retirement plans. The company can work directly with plan sponsors to help them design a suitable retirement program, but more typically, Morningstar distributes its retirement services through retirement plan providers that package its advice and investment line-ups with administrative and recordkeeping services. Over the past two years, Morningstar has expanded its distribution network to include retirement plan advisors and asset managers and currently offer three advisor-focused services. The first, Morningstar Plan Advantage, is a practice-management platform that helps advisors to build and manage their retirement plans. That service is currently used by two large broker dealers and has data integrations with 25 recordkeepers. The second service, advisor managed accounts (AMA), enables advisors and asset managers to offer a version of managed accounts that incorporates their firm’s investment allocation philosophies and branding. Morningstar also can now offer managed accounts that sit within an IRA product offered by the RIA or recordkeeper. It currently has 10 recordkeepers signed onto the AMA platform with 15 RIAs and one asset management firm offering it. The third is a service that enables asset managers to offer personalized target-date funds using our methodologies, technology, and recordkeeper data connections. These personal target-date funds enable employees in a retirement plan to receive a blended target-date fund based on several data points, including age, salary, savings rate, and account balance. ==== ''Individual investors'' ==== Morningstar offers tools and content for individual investors who invest to build wealth and save for other goals, such as retirement or college tuition. A Gallup survey released in August 2021 found that approximately 56% of individuals in the U.S. invest in the stock market either directly, through mutual funds, or self-directed retirement plans. Morningstar designs products for individual investors who are actively involved in the investing process and want to take charge of their own investment decisions. The company also reach individuals who want to learn more about investing or want to validate the advice they receive from brokers or financial advisors. The company's main product for individual investors is Morningstar.com, which can be accessed via desktop, tablet, or mobile phone applications, and includes both paid Premium Memberships and free content available to registered users and visitors. Morningstar also reaches individual investors through licensing its content to other websites, such as Yahoo Finance, MSN Money, and Google Finance.
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