This report analyzes and summarizes the asset management industry’s income and balance sheet metrics on an aggregate and per company level. 
 
The reader will obtain an overview of the industry’s accounting metrics, how these have evolved between 2012 to 2025, and will see trends over time from a proprietary dataset. In particular, the report provides summaries of aggregated industry income and balance sheet, components in AuM change, accounting margins, investment returns, investment performance, and alternative asset managers.  Moreover, the report provides new insights through regression models to explain market return, returns to scale, net inflows, and alternative manager performance.
 
The audience for this report is CEOs, CFOs, financial analysts, financial journalists, industry consultants, advisory consultants, regulators, AM sales teams, AM clients and potential clients, private investors, portfolio managers, academics, and other interested persons.
 
Table of Contents
Overview
Purpose
Data
Related publications
Executive Summary
Industry Income
Aggregate Industry Income
Industry Income Margins
Does AuM Margin Increase with Scale?
Per Company AuM Margin
Top Asset Managers by AuM and Revenue
Operating Margin (Cost-Income Ratio)
End-To-End Efficiency
Does Profit Margin Increase with AuM?
Industry Balance Sheet
Aggregate Industry Equity and Capital
Aggregate Industry Balance Sheet Metrics
Per Company RoE and RoC
Change in Assets Under Management
Industry Aggregate
Relative Contribution to Change in AuM
Explaining Net Flows
Alternative Asset Managers
Investment Return
Industry Aggregate Investment Return
Investment Return Per Manager
Sharpe Ratio
Explaining Investment Return
Where Do Asset Managers Invest?
Appendix
Regression Results
 
Table of Figures
Table 1: Aggregate Industry Income Statement (USD bn)
Figure 1: Revenue, EBT, Net Profit
Table 2: Volume Weighted Industry Income Margins
Table 3: Equally Weighted Industry Income Margins
Figure 2: Aggregate AuM Margin
Figure 3: Aggregate Operating, Gross, and Net Profit Margin
Table 4: OLS Regression: AuM Margin ~ AuM
Figure 4: AuM Margin by AuM
Figure 5: Change in AuM Margin from 2012 to 2025 Per Asset Manager
Figure 6: Per Company AuM Margin
Table 5: Revenue and AuM in 2025 for Largest Asset Managers
Figure 7: Top 10 Largest by Revenue
Figure 8: AuM Margin of Top 10 Largest Asset Managers by AuM
Figure 9: Operating Margin by Asset Manager: Mean 2012-2025 and 2025
Figure 10: Earnings Efficiency per AuM
Table 6: OLS Regression Result: Gross Profit Margin ~ AuM
Figure 11: AuM to Operating Margin (All Years)
Figure 12: Total Industry Equity and Capital
Table 7: Equal-weighted Balance Sheet Metrics
Table 8: Volume-weighted Balance Sheet Metrics
Figure 13: RoE and RoC
Figure 14: Per Company RoE
Figure 15: Per Company RoC
Table 9: Aggregate Industry AuM Change by Component
Figure 16: Change in Absolute AuM by Component
Table 10: Components of yoy AuM Growth
Figure 17: Relative Change in AuM by Component
Figure 18: Cumulative Contribution to AuM Growth
Table 11: OLS Regression: Relative Net Inflows ~ SP500
Figure 19: Relative Net Flows to Equity Index Change
Table 12: OLS Regression: Relative Net Inflows ~ High Yield Bond Interest Rate
Table 13: Comparison of Key Measures of Alternative vs. Traditional Managers
Figure 20: RoE and RoC 2012-2025 - Traditional vs Alternative
Figure 21: Profit Margins 2012-2025 - Traditional vs Alternative
Figure 22:End-to-end Efficiency 2012-2025 - Traditional vs Alternative
Figure 23:Investment Return 2012-2025 - Traditional vs Alternative
Table 15: Aggregate Industry Investment Return
Figure 24: Mean Investment Return Per Asset Manager
Figure 25: Investment Return Sharpe Ratio Per Asset Manager
Table 16: OLS Regression Result: Investment Return ~ ACWI
Table 17: Explaining Country Level Returns