Company
Charles Schwab is a major U.S. brokerage offering retail investing, banking, and wealth management, and a leading custodian for independent investment advisors.
Schwab's third-quarter net new assets rose 38% to 43% from a year earlier, with qz.com and The Daily Upside reporting different totals. Neither total isolates the sweep cash that AI agents are expected to move, so the quarter dents the near-term case and leaves the forward one untested.
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Schwab will block AI agents that log in with client credentials or browser automation, CEO Rick Wurster said on its earnings call. American Banker reports a view that billions in cash-sweep interest revenue is the real fear.
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Schwab has opened bitcoin and ether trading to eligible retail clients on a $13.33 trillion platform at a 0.75% fee. CEO Rick Wurster calls it transaction revenue, and each $1 billion traded would yield $7.5 million.
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Schwab executives said wealth advisory net flows grew 55% in the third quarter, in a division with about 2% of a $37 trillion advice market. Consultant Tim Welch says the firm is shrinking its RIA referral program while it builds a competing offer.
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Anthropic released Claude for Financial Advisors with 11 new connectors to custodians and wealth-tech providers plus workflow skills. Its pitch is more client time, and a firm's first decision is who approves what Claude drafts from custodial data.
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Meta's Muse agent passed 5 million downloads in a month as Planet Fitness and Booking, which profit when customers don't compare or cancel, fell 11% to 12%. Retailers have stayed near the index, and their open question is who completes the purchase and keeps the data.
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Fidelity is giving advisory firms with less than $100 million on its custody platform until June 30 to move their accounts elsewhere. For firms that use Fidelity as their only custodian, the move means months of repapering client accounts, American Banker reported.
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SEC estimates its proposed crypto self-custody fallback will cost each adviser that uses it $433,833 a year, and assumes about 823 firms will. After the CLARITY Act's Senate failure, that price helps decide which advisers can hold newly launched tokens for clients.
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Fidelity will require RIAs already on its custody platform to hold at least $100 million there by June 30, 2027, or leave. AdvizorPro data counts about 1,150 firms below that line, The Daily Upside reported, while Fidelity puts the number at a few hundred.
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Paxos added XRP, a token worth nearly $95 billion, to its Crypto Brokerage platform on October 7, opening it to clients such as PayPal and Schwab. Retail buyers get it only when a partner lists it, a step Schwab's August token plan did not take.
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Webull shares fell about 20% after the House Select Committee on China found the brokerage's China ties a national security risk to US investors. Whether the finding costs more than share price depends on the $24.6 billion of customer assets the committee says Webull holds.
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Fidelity has set a $100 million asset minimum for RIA clients, whose median firm already runs $328 million, according to AdvizorPro. Advisers below the line can pool assets through a consolidator, move to another custodian or grow, and each route has a cost.
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Fidelity's plan to drop custody clients under $100 million has Schwab, Axos and Betterment courting advisors who have to move assets by June 30, 2027. The only offer with published terms loses value each month an advisor waits.
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Cerulli Associates and Morningstar found 53.4% of advisors who don't prioritize wealth growth rank help converting 401(k) participants a top-three need. Recordkeepers are courting the same savers, so an advisor who turns away small accounts risks the sponsor and the eventual rollover.
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Bond ETFs and funds took in $26.4 billion in the five days through Oct. 1, a week when the 10-year Treasury yield reached 5.35%, its highest since April 2002. Vanguard's Joyce Huang says most of the recent buying sits at the short end, where savers get yield with little exposure to further rate rises.
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SEC proposals approved Wednesday would give registered investment advisors much more room to charge performance fees on capital gains in client accounts. Interval-fund changes and a credential route to accredited status widen what retail clients can buy, and the fee rule changes how advisors get paid for it.
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Two Harbors' TWOD holders who tender after the CrossCountry Mortgage buyout can expect about $26.3841 a share, roughly 6 cents above the likely sale price. Once a seller's cash earns two weeks of Treasury-bill yield, the edge shrinks to under 3 cents, so the dates matter more than the price.
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Planet Fitness is down 20% since Meta's Muse agent launched Sept. 8, against 7% for upscale gym Life Time. The gap suggests investors already sort easy cancellations from sticky memberships, though Jim Cramer calls the 'consumer inertia' sell-off too broad.
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Betterment will charge RIAs 0.20% on custody assets under $10 million and 0.12% above that from Jan. 1, with a negotiated rate past $100 million. Setting the rate by assets held at Betterment pays advisers to move a bigger slice there while Schwab or Fidelity keeps the main book.
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The largest acquisition in Vanguard's history is a distribution deal with a second target: the net interest income rival custodians earn on client cash.
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