3.68 % of firms have not added employees over the last three years.
3.68 % of firms have laid off employees over the last 24 months.
8.92 % of firms lost employees to another firm.
HOW ADVISORS FOUND EMPLOYEES IN LAST 3 YEARS
Referrals From Other Employees
Referrals From Outside Sources
Through College Placement Programs
Internet Advertising
LinkedIn
28.49 %
NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES
trol over a firm significantly greater than the size their stake might dictate. Sometimes the pace of deals gets dizzying. More than a few advisors have sold their business to another firm that turns around and sells itself, disrupting the normal course of business.
All the evidence is that the lion’ s share of the growth in the RIA world is coming from the largest firms, the ones investing millions in marketing and client acquisition. Companies like Fisher Investments and Creative Planning are now running national TV advertising campaigns, while dozens more firms are spending millions, often eight-figure amounts, to generate leads. Many big RIAs also participate in Schwab’ s and Fidelity’ s referral programs, which provide a stream of leads to self-directed investors open to advice.
If you’ re an RIA advisor and Google your own name( even if it’ s imaginative), you’ re likely to see a list of giants appear before yours. Schwab’ s“ 2025 RIA Benchmarking Study” found that the top-performing firms spend 2.4 % of their revenues on marketing and business development while those figures drop to 1.9 % to 2.2 % among other firms.
If the big are getting bigger, they are doing so partly by attracting more clients, though they’ re also winning
CATEGORY
39.34 %
52.91 %
68.80 %
69.19 %
2025 MEAN
2024 MEAN
Executives, partners and managing directors 13.56 11.80 Client relationship managers not included above 20.00 16.31 Other professionals / specialists not included above 20.84 17.69 Client services staff 15.03 12.93 Administrative staff 8.85 7.37 TOTAL EMPLOYEES 79.49 67.95 clients with more assets. Philip Palaveev, the chief executive officer at the Ensemble Practice, a practice management firm, conducts a survey every year that supports this claim.
“ The statistical correlation between the size of the firm( small) and the size of the client relationship( small) is very strong,” he says, even if that correlation has varied from one survey to the next.“ The R-squared is almost 60 % this year, and it has been as high as 90 %, meaning one variable explains almost fully the other.”
Rising tides are lifting almost all boats. Palaveev’ s research reveals that smaller firms are enjoying healthy revenues and valuations, even if they are working with smaller clients. The small firms he surveyed typically generate about $ 9,000 per client. Larger firms with more than $ 3 billion in assets capture fees of about $ 30,000 per client.
This is the problem with small practices. As Lazaroff points out, everyone is going to“ have to add services, and that’ s a problem for small firms.”
There is another problem constraining advisor growth. The investor class has enjoyed hefty stock market gains over the last 15 years, which means many clients are satisfied with their current advisors.( In many cases, their biggest problems are large, huge, unrealized capital gains that are creating concentration risks in their portfolios.)
But the stickiness of current relationships isn’ t stopping ambitious advisors from trying to break in and launch their own businesses, as about 677 firms did last year, according to the Investment Adviser Association( which counted the total universe at 16,544 firms). Some are coming out of the gate with big ambitions.
The biggest splash was made last September by OpenArc Corporate Advisory, an Atlanta startup that came out of Bank of America / Merrill Lynch as one of the largest wirehouse breakaways ever. OpenArc was formerly an institutional advisory specializing in 401( k) plans. It was reportedly Merrill’ s largest such unit, overseeing about $ 129 billion( or about 3 % of Bank of America / Merrill’ s approximately $ 4 trillion at the end of 2025).
Tucked into that business was a substantial wealth management business.
“ We weren’ t able to be a true fiduciary,” says Kevin Higginbotham, who now serves as OpenArc’ s head of wealth management.“ Half the time we were
3.68 % of firms have not added employees over the last three years.
3.68 % of firms have laid off employees over the last 24 months.
8.92 % of firms lost employees to another firm.
24 | FINANCIAL ADVISOR MAGAZINE | JULY / AUGUST 2026 WWW. FA-MAG. COM