F.R.E.A.M.: An Early Look at April '26 & 2Q26 Traditional Asset Manager Flows

Research evidence excerpt

F.R.E.A.M.: An Early Look at April '26 & 2Q26 Traditional Asset Manager Flows

Financials

May 11, 2026

Glenn Schorr, CFA F.R.E.A.M.: An Early Look at April '26 &

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glenn.schorr@evercoreisi.com 2Q26 Traditional Asset Manager Flows

John Dunn As the Wu-Tang Clan rightfully said (kinda) in ‘93, F.R.E.A.M. -

212-446-9455 Flows Rule Everything Around Me in Asset Mgmt-Land…

John.Dunn@EvercoreISI.com

Benjamin Rubin, CFA, CPA April flows were a better, but still very selective, tape for

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Benjamin.Rubin@evercoreisi.com the traditional managers. It was less a wholesale return of

Matthew Lyons, CFA animal spirits than a rotation toward the parts of the market

212-336-1709 investors could underwrite (e.g. liquid beta, targeted credit

matthew.lyons@evercoreISI.com income, cash mgmt., duration hedges & scarce-asset

exposures). Industry active retail L-T decay improved m/m

as equity outflows moderated & fixed income swung back

to positive, while ETF demand remained resilient. The

punchline is that investors were still willing to take risk in

April, but only where the exposure was liquid, scalable &

defensible. In terms of markets, there has been a broad

rally so far in 2Q26 with a clear pro-growth, pro-cyclical tilt,

led by high-beta equities, tech & international markets,

while credit & defensives have participated more

unevenly.

How the Publicly Traded Group Is Doing? For the

public managers, most appear to have posted m/m

improvement (Fig. 1). Aggregate flows (with or without

BLK) were better as the median rate swung to +4% from -

4% in March (Fig. 2).

We expect 4-of-the-9 managers that report monthly flows

to be positive, unchanged m/m. For 2Q, we expect 10-of-

the-14 in the space to see organic growth, up one q/q.