The 5 largest broker dealers by assets under management. List of the biggest broker dealers in the U.S. and the world by total AUM.

The 5 Largest Broker-Dealers Overview

Main Discoveries:

• Judged by number of customers, Fidelity Investments is the largest broker-dealer in the United States.

• Although Robinhood is a recent entrant into the brokerage industry, it manages to get into the top 5.

• Many brokerage firms these days have millions of accounts.

If you’re looking for a large brokerage firm to help you with your trading, here is the top 5 broker-dealers in the United States:

Fidelity Investments

First on our list is the behemoth Fidelity Investments. This investment firm has over 51.5 million customer accounts, making it the largest broker-dealer on our list. This staggering number reflects mostly self-directed brokerage accounts. Because the company has large operations in workplace savings plans like 401(k) accounts, the real figure is probably quite a bit larger. At the same time, some clients will have multiple accounts; we can safely estimate the number of customers in the tens of millions, making Fidelity a very large investment firm.

In terms of assets under administration (AUA), Fidelity delivers another gigantic number: more than $14.1 trillion. AUA reflects assets in both brokerage and investment-advisory programs. For discretionary programs where Fidelity has trading authority, the number is a smaller $6 trillion, which is still massive.

Every market day, Fidelity’s self-directed brokerage clients place about 4.5 million trades on average. This is another enormous number, making the investment firm a titan among giants.

Learn more in Fidelity Reviews.

Vanguard

A close second on our list is Vanguard, who boasts around 50 million customer accounts. As with Fidelity, there are many investment programs at Vanguard, so the actual number is in all probability quite higher. For example, Vanguard has workplace plans and international programs that provide foreign-based accounts.

In terms of total client assets (AUA), Vanguard comes in at roughly $10.4 trillion, making it a very large firm indeed. Managing all of the accounts and assets is a global team of approximately 20,000 workers, another large figure.

Learn more in Vanguard review.

Charles Schwab

Third on our list is Charles Schwab. In its purchase of TD Ameritrade in 2020, it acquired roughly 17 million customer accounts, which were worth nearly $2 trillion.

Today, Schwab has 37 million brokerage accounts, making it a formidable competitor with the other two we have just looked at. The 37 million figure includes both full-service and self-directed brokerage accounts. Then there are workplace plan participant accounts that Schwab oversees. These are accounts such as 401(k) accounts. Schwab has 5.6 million of these.





Schwab also operates Schwab Bank. In this unit of the company, we find another 2.1 million accounts; this number is composed of both checking and savings accounts.

In total, we see a figure of around 45 million accounts, which puts Schwab very near the top of our list.





Schwab’s brokerage customers place an average of 7 million trades every market day, a figure that exceeds the one we found for Fidelity.

In terms of total client assets, Schwab has $10.8 trillion in its treasure chest at last count. This figure includes bank deposits, investment accounts (brokerage and managed), and workplace plan assets. It also includes $1.34 trillion in Schwab mutual funds and ETFs.

Learn more in Charles Schwab review.

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Robinhood

Robinhood doesn’t operate its own bank or manage its own lineup of mutual funds and ETFs. It does have 26 million brokerage accounts, though. This impressive figure places the company in fourth place on our list. Because Robinhood just started in 2013, it represents astonishing growth.

Robinhood’s 26 million self-directed accounts make up roughly $139.7 billion in assets. Thus, we see an average account value of around $8,500, which is far lower than the average that can be calculated for the other three firms above. Nevertheless, Robinhood is growing.





For example, the amount of cash in investment accounts being swept to program banks has been steadily increasing. The number of margin loans has also gone up, and Robinhood is seeing more option trades from its clients (about 1.2 million every day). Robinhood customers place an average of 2.3 million equity trades per day. On the crypto side of the business, the average is 500,000.

Learn more in Robinhood review.

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Edward Jones

Rounding out our top 5 is Edward Jones with over 9 million customers. These clients open both managed and brokerage accounts, which help to create $2 trillion in assets. To manage its large cornucopia of clients and assets, Edward Jones has more than 20,000 financial planners within a workforce of 55,000 people. And with 16,000 local offices, it’s easy to see how large this traditional investment firm really is (despite being fifth on our list).

Learn more in Edward Jones review.

Honorable Mention

- Kraken is a crypto-stock brokerage firm with operations in both industries. At last count, the company had over 15 million accounts. This number is composed mostly of crypto accounts as its securities business is rather new.

- Coinbase is a crypto-only broker with 8.4 million self-directed accounts.

- Morgan Stanley has 8.2 million brokerage and managed accounts. This number includes Morgan Stanley’s subsidiary E*Trade; also included are cash accounts and workplace retirement accounts.

Combined with its subsidiary E*Trade, Morgan Stanley has 80,000 employees worldwide. Over 40 countries have Morgan Stanley offices, a figure that shows the great reach of this global firm.