BlackRock just filed to launch the iShares Nasdaq-100 ETF, ticker IQQ, and if you’re Invesco, this is the phone call you’ve been dreading for 27 years.
The filing, submitted to the SEC on April 6, represents the first serious challenge to Invesco’s QQQ Trust, which has sat atop the Nasdaq-100 tracking category with somewhere between $374 billion and $426 billion in assets under management. And BlackRock, the $10 trillion gorilla of asset management, apparently looked at that pile of money and thought: we’d like some of that.
The great Nasdaq-100 land grab
The day after BlackRock’s filing, State Street submitted its own application for a competing Nasdaq-100 ETF. Two of the three largest asset managers on the planet decided, within 24 hours of each other, that Invesco’s near-monopoly had lasted long enough.
The Nasdaq-100 tracks 100 of the largest non-financial companies listed on the Nasdaq exchange. The index climbed 27.5% in 2025, driven largely by insatiable investor appetite for anything touching artificial intelligence.
