Charles Schwab
Opening our list is the widely recognized Charles Schwab. The company currently maintains more than
39.5 million brokerage accounts,
5.9 million workplace plan participant accounts, and
2.4 million banking accounts.
Schwab entered the financial industry several decades after Fidelity. Charles Schwab founded the business in 1971, when it was incorporated in California as First Commander Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Commander Industries, Inc. The company was created to conduct a traditional broker-dealer operation and publish an investment newsletter named the Schwab Investment Indicator. Today, the brokerage firm publishes a quarterly investing magazine called Onward.
Charles Schwab continues to serve as
co-chairman of the company. Schwab’s headquarters is in Westlake, Texas, while the firm continues to operate several locations in San Francisco and more than 420 local branches nationwide. Nearly all of these branches are located within the United States.
Schwab is particularly well known for helping move the brokerage industry toward lower trading costs. Decades before Robinhood appeared and Internet access became widespread, Schwab began cutting commissions after the SEC ended fixed brokerage commission schedules on
May 1, 1975.
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Fidelity Investments
The next company in our ranking of the largest U.S. broker-dealers is Fidelity Investments, which administers more than 57 million
accounts. This is an extraordinary total by almost any measure.
Fidelity’s history extends back to 1943, when Edward C. Johnson II assumed the presidency of the Fidelity Fund. The present-day organization took shape in
1946, when Johnson established Fidelity Management & Research Company. Fidelity has since developed into one of the largest asset-management companies in the world. Despite its enormous size, the firm remains privately owned, and Edward Johnson’s granddaughter, Abigail Johnson, serves as its chairman and CEO.
Fidelity was established in Boston and continues to maintain its headquarters in the city. Although Boston remains the center of the company’s operations, Fidelity now maintains
215 Investor Centers and 14 global regional sites. The company has more than
80,000 associates working across 11 countries, further illustrating the tremendous scale of this brokerage and financial-services organization.
Vanguard
Vanguard occupies the third position on our list. This prominent investment company serves more than 50 million+ customers, many of
whom are drawn to its longstanding focus on inexpensive index investing. Founder John C. Bogle created Vanguard in
1975, and the company introduced the first index mutual fund designed for individual investors the following year.
As Schwab and Fidelity do, Vanguard operates a large proprietary lineup of mutual funds and exchange-traded funds. Investors have placed trillions of dollars in these products, demonstrating the remarkable scale of this Pennsylvania-based investment company. Vanguard’s U.S. mutual funds and ETFs have an asset-weighted average expense ratio of only
0.06%, underscoring the firm’s continuing commitment to keeping investment costs low.
Vanguard is the first company, though not the only one, in our ranking of the largest broker-dealers that does not operate a network of walk-in investor branches. Even without traditional retail offices, the company conducts substantial brokerage and investment-advisory operations.
Vanguard also stands apart because of the way the company is owned.
Vanguard fund shareholders own the funds, and those funds collectively own Vanguard.
J.P. Morgan
J.P. Morgan takes the fourth spot in our ranking. Through its extensive retail and institutional operations, this financial company provides services to millions of individual customers, businesses, and institutional clients. Its U.S. Wealth Management operation has approximately
$1.3 trillion in client investment assets, while the larger Asset & Wealth Management division oversees about
$7.7 trillion in client assets. Chase is JPMorganChase’s consumer and community banking brand rather than an independently owned sister company. JPMorganChase has approximately
$5.0 trillion in total assets and $2.7 trillion in average deposits, placing it among the largest financial-services institutions worldwide. The company’s headquarters is in New York City.
Morgan Stanley/E*TRADE
Completing the top five are Morgan Stanley and E*TRADE, its online discount brokerage subsidiary. Together, the company’s businesses oversee more than $10 trillion in client assets
across brokerage, investment-advisory, asset-management, and workplace channels.
Morgan Stanley purchased E*TRADE in 2020, adding a substantial self-directed retail brokerage operation to its established investment-banking, wealth-management, and institutional businesses. Morgan Stanley’s worldwide headquarters is located at
1585 Broadway in New York City.
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Merrill
Merrill is the next company included in our ranking. Merrill Wealth Management and the Merrill Edge investment platforms belong to Bank of America, forming another exceptionally large financial-services
organization. Merrill Edge administers more than
4 million+ accounts containing approximately
$640 billion in client assets.
Robinhood
Robinhood follows Merrill on our list. The brokerage company has slightly more than $369 billion in
Total Platform Assets,
an amount below the asset totals maintained by the biggest firms covered in this survey. Nevertheless, Robinhood serves
more than 28.4 million funded customers, which represents an exceptionally large
customer base for a company established only in 2013. Both its customer and asset totals continue to increase.
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Webull
Webull is an even more recent arrival in the brokerage industry. Founded in 2017, the investment company now serves more than
28.2 million registered users worldwide. Collectively, these
customers have placed more than $28.5 billion in assets on Webull’s platforms. The company’s exceptional expansion eventually led to a
public listing on Nasdaq through a business combination during the first half of 2025.
Webull Corporation is a publicly listed Cayman Islands holding company with its headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida. The firm’s primary research and development operation is based in Changsha, China. Webull conducts business through
numerous subsidiaries in international markets, including prominent operations in Hong Kong and Singapore. Clients of the Hong Kong subsidiary can trade
eligible mainland China A-shares and A-share ETFs through Stock Connect, an investment capability that remains unavailable
at many competing brokerage firms.
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Updated on 8/3/2026.
Chad Morris has been analyzing investment firms for Brokerage-Review.com since 2015. Backed by FINRA Series 65, 66, and SIE credentials, his work reflects a deep knowledge of the retail brokerage industry and digital trading tools.