The market share of discretionary portfolio management clients in the UK are increasingly being dominated by the largest wealth firms in the nation, according to a report by the Financial Conduct Authority.
Discretionary portfolio management (DPM) is by far the most common type of service offered to wealth clients in the UK, according to British watchdog Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) Wealth management survey report – 2026.
By assets under management (AUM), DPM accounts for 65%, followed by execution-only services at 27% and advisory services at 8%, for the 2024/2025 fiscal year. The number of portfolio management clients have grown to 1.3 million, up 20% since 2022.
Within DPM, the client market is becoming increasingly concentrated. While the share of discretionary AUM from the ten largest firms remains broadly stable at 59%, compared to 62% in 2022, their share of clients has surged. Between 2022 and 2025, the number of DPM clients serviced by these leading players rose from 70% to 89%.
In terms of asset allocation, the survey indicates a shift towards lower risk. In the past two years, the proportion of clients invested in portfolios with 80-100% equity exposure fell from 24.9% to 21.5%, while the proportion in 40-60% equity exposure rose from 24.5% to 27.9%.
Positive outlook
On the outlook, wealth management firms remain confident with 41% planning to acquire another firm, grow revenue, or increase their client base by more than 25% over the next two years. In contrast, just 18% that are considering winding down, or selling all or part of their client base.
“Consolidation can support efficiency and growth by helping firms pool resources, expertise and technology. It can also support stronger governance and financial resilience,” FCA said.
“However, we have also seen that if fast growth of these businesses is not managed effectively, it may create poor outcomes. These could include poor client service, weaknesses in business continuity and in some cases disorderly failure. As firms grow, governance, oversight and controls need to keep pace, so clients receive consistent outcomes.”
This is the third edition of FCA’s wealth management survey, since the first once was conducted in 2022. 400 firms participated in the survey and are part those supervised within FCA’s wealth management portfolio, which support more than 5.5 million retail clients and manage nearly GBP1 trillion (USD1.36 trillion) of assets.
