Recently Released!!!
Date Published: November 2011
Comprehensive Power Point Deck: 1,167 Slides
Summary Power Point Deck: 70 Slides

The purpose of this research is to provide readers with an initial understanding of the fee-based financial advisors (RIAs) market, the fastest growing financial services market & distribution channel. The research goes to painstaking efforts to define this market, which is often improperly defined and measured by others. A parallel research topic published by Tiburon, called A Comprehensive Overview of the Product Usage, Business Models, & Best Practices of Fee-Based Financial Advisors, provides extensive bottom up analysis of the specific actions of fee-based financial advisors. This research provides a top down view of the market. Some fee-based financial advisors are dually registered, hanging a brokerage license at a friendly independent broker/dealer; those fee-based financial advisors are referred to as hybrid advisors in this research and are likewise addressed in Tiburon's independent reps research.

This research addresses the three historical phases of fee-based financial advisors including:

• Formation Phase
• Expansion Phase
• Maturation Phase
  

This research defines four distinct markets segments including:

• Securities & Exchange Commission Registered Investment Advisors
• State Registered Investment Advisors
• Non-Fee-Based Financial Advisor RIA Segments
• Non-RIA Related Market Segments

And this research makes the following predictions:

• Break-Away Brokers & Rapid Growth in Industry Assets Under Management
• Continuing Central Role of Custodians & Difficulty in Penetrating Custody Market
• Continuing Use of Mutual Funds & Individual Securities and Growing Use of Exchange Traded Funds, Alternative Investments, & Wealth Management Products
• Continuing Search for the Technology Holy Grail & Opportunities in Outsourcing
• Long-Awaited Consolidation in the Industry & the Potential of Producer Groups