What is a wirehouse?
"Wirehouse" is industry shorthand for the biggest national full-service brokerages: firms with thousands of financial advisors on staff, branch offices across the country, and a parent that is a bank or investment bank. The advisors are employees. The firm owns the branch, pays for staff and technology, supervises the advisors and holds the client accounts in its own name.
The model is one of several channels advisors work in. Regional firms and banks run smaller employee models; independent broker-dealers such as LPL Financial affiliate advisors who run their own businesses as contractors; and registered investment advisers (RIAs) are fee-based firms that hold client assets at an outside custodian such as Schwab or Fidelity.
Which firms are wirehouses?
Four firms are counted as wirehouses today, each the wealth arm of a larger financial group. Their most recent reported figures, from filings with the SEC:
Morgan Stanley Wealth Management: $8.43 trillion in total client assets, $3.16 trillion of it in fee-based accounts, and $232.4 billion of net new assets in the third quarter of 2026. Morgan Stanley no longer reports its advisor headcount.
Merrill (Bank of America): Merrill Wealth Management client balances of $4.24 trillion at Sept. 30, 2026. Bank of America reports Merrill together with its Private Bank as Global Wealth & Investment Management, which had $7.12 billion of revenue in the third quarter.
Wells Fargo Advisors: Wells Fargo's Wealth and Investment Management segment reported $2.45 trillion in client assets and $4.10 billion of revenue in the third quarter of 2026.
UBS: the Swiss bank's Global Wealth Management business reported $2.42 trillion of invested assets in the Americas and 5,644 advisors there (full-time equivalents) at June 30, 2026, out of $4.94 trillion and 9,173 advisors worldwide.
Is Fidelity a wirehouse?
No. Fidelity Investments is a privately held asset manager and brokerage. Its advisors serve Fidelity's own retail clients, and through Fidelity Institutional it holds assets for independent advisers as a custodian. That custody business is large: in Form ADV filings from Oct. 1, 2025 to Sept. 30, 2026, 1,999 wealth management RIAs named Fidelity as a custodian, holding $3.26 trillion there, second to Schwab.
On Oct. 1, 2026 Fidelity told RIAs they must hold at least $100 million at Fidelity by June 30, 2027 or move custody elsewhere.
Is Charles Schwab a wirehouse?
No. Schwab is a brokerage and bank whose largest advisor business is custody for independent RIAs. In the same Form ADV filings, 5,774 wealth management RIAs named Schwab as a custodian, more than any other firm, with $4.37 trillion held.
Why is it called a wirehouse?
Before electronic trading, the national brokerages connected their branch offices to headquarters and the exchange floor by private telegraph and, later, telephone wires, which let branches get quotes and send orders faster than smaller firms. The firms became known as wire houses. The wires are long gone and most of the original names have merged away, but the label stuck to the four largest survivors.
How are wirehouse advisors paid?
Wirehouse advisors are paid a percentage of the revenue they generate, set by a tiered grid: the more they produce, the higher the rate. Morgan Stanley's grid runs from 28% to 55.5% and Merrill's standard grid from 34% to 51%, as reported in 2026. Firms pay recruiting deals, often structured as forgivable loans, to bring experienced advisors over.
Advisors leaving and joining wirehouses
Financial ADVSR's Moves tracker records every reported advisor and team move, including teams that leave a wirehouse for an RIA or independent broker-dealer and those recruited between wirehouses. The weekly Recruiting Scoreboard and the quarterly State of Advisor Recruiting add the moves up by firm and channel.