BlackRock's latest disclosure may reassure investors who are worried about the impending departure of Bob Doll.

In January, a change was made to the fund literature, wrote Reuters reporter Jessica Toonkel. Previously, the firm said its Large Cap Series was based on a "proprietary multi-factor quantitative model." Now, the strategy is said to be based on "quantitative factor models generated by third-party research firms."

Sources told Toonkel the change was not because of a shift in process, but because the funds' board of directors came to know the system was never proprietary.

BlackRock spokeswoman Bobbie Collins told Toonkel in an e-mail the change was part of the "regular process of keeping the board up to date on fund management."

Doll, who leaves BlackRock at the end of the month, said in an e-mail that he'd used many models for years.

"In some cases, I had the models customized for us to reflect my view of key input factors," Doll said in the e-mail to Reuters. "I then applied a relative weighting to these models. We used these outputs as one part of my investment process, which also included a fundamental analysis." 

Edited by: Ben Geier


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