According to a survey co-led by the Association of Investment Advisers, the RIA industry has set a record number of investment advisers, firms and clients in 2023.

Additionally, assets under management by SEC-registered advisors jumped 12.6% in 2023 from the market's decline a year earlier, compared to 2021 highs. The number of advisors grew by nearly 2 %. according to the annual photograph co-created by the IAA and COMPLY, which works with chief compliance officers at RIAs.

Last year, the number of firms registered with the SEC increased by 282, reaching a record 15,396 firms (there were increases in 21 of the previous 23 years, excluding 2010 and 2011, though those declines came in part from the SEC increasing the minimum size threshold for registration to $100 million from $25 million).

Also, the number of non-clerk employees exceeded 1 million for the first time last year, increasing by 3.6%. Most advisors and firms are on the smaller end of the spectrum, with 88% of advisors having less than $5 billion in AUM (58.3% of them are in the $100 million to $1 billion range).

However, more than 92% of client assets were managed at firms with more than $5 billion in AUM, and 66% of assets were managed by the industry's 207 largest firms, according to the survey.

Firms with $100B+ AUM saw the strongest growth over the past decade, although more than half of that growth was from firms expanding to this size. Employment growth was also strongest at these firms.

Firms under $100 million fell during this period (down 17.2% last year). However, according to the IAA, during periods of rising asset values, firms in this range either move to more important categories or close their SEC registration altogether. In 2023, 1114 new advisory firms were formed, while 832 advisers completed their registrations, resulting in a total of 282 new firms.

The total number of clients served by registered firms increased by 3.5% to 64.1 million, despite a decline in non-asset management clients for the second consecutive year (which the IAA attributed to the growth of digital platforms offering non-asset services of asset management).

However, the total number of asset management clients reached a record 56.7 million in 2023, an increase of 4.4% from the previous year, according to the survey. More than 85% of clients were non-high net worth individuals (with less than $1.1 million in AUM or net worth below $2.2 million), although 64.3% of total assets under management came from 14.7% of clients with high net worth.

The percentage of advisors using multiple websites or social media platforms to communicate with clients increased to 65.2% in 2023 from 49.1% in 2018. LinkedIn continued to be the most used social media platform, with 59.1% of respondents reported using it (up from 39.3% in 2018).

In 2018, 19.2% and 18.1% used Twitter and Facebook respectively. But in 2023, more advisors chose Facebook; 26.1% of advisors used that platform, compared to 22% who use Twitter (now X). 10.8% and 10.1% used YouTube and Instagram respectively.