Scale authenticity verification: Who is the true "Number One" in the buy-side investment advisory market?

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Reprinted from: China Business News

Zhongjing reporter Sun Ruxiang and Xia Xin report from Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou

The wealth management and investment advisory pilot program has entered its 7th year. There are 60 pilot institutions—who is the “No. 1” in this emerging market?

When it comes to the scale data and rankings that institutions “self-disclose,” will they choose favorable definitions and selectively disclose them?

When the market lacks unified, authoritative statistical definitions, what adverse impacts will that bring to investors’ decisions and to industry development?

As the “infrastructure” of the buy-side wealth management and advisory market, which stakeholders should jointly build unified statistical standards and definitions? What are the feasible paths for implementation?

These questions trouble not only investors, but also wealth management and advisory practitioners. And behind disputes over scale definitions lies an even more important question of industry value orientation: is it a “scale game of pooling funds,” or a true reflection of “the health of customer accounts”?

Inconsistent scale statistical definitions are no longer just a technical issue of data comparability—they also determine whether the buy-side wealth management and advisory industry can truly implement its original mission of putting “customers first.”

Around the above issues, reporters from China Business News conducted in-depth interviews with multiple industry experts and heads of institutions, aiming to clarify the diverse definitions currently used for wealth management and advisory scale statistics on the buy-side, analyze the business logic behind differences in rankings, and discuss feasible paths to unify accounting standards.

Where do the different wealth management advisory scale definitions differ?

When “scale” becomes the focus of the buy-side wealth management and advisory market, the market’s scale statistical definitions still have not been unified for a long time.

Tian Lihui, Dean of the Institute of Financial Development at Tianjin University, said that currently there are at least three mainstream definitions in the market: the narrowest definition—“fund wealth management advisory (投顾) business assets under management”; a broader one—“buy-side wealth management advisory signed asset scale”; and the broadest one—“wealth management client assets.”

“In industry discussions of ‘buy-side wealth management advisory scale,’ there are at least three common definitions, but these definitions do not measure the same thing. Therefore, disclosures must include both the ‘definition + time point’ for comparability,” said Luo Ronghua, Dean of the School of Finance at Southwestern University of Finance and Economics.

Luo Ronghua believes that among the three definitions, “service asset scale / advisory assets under custody” refers to assets that, within the advisory strategy framework, are actually allocated, continuously tracked, involve rebalancing, and leave service records. This definition is closest to the “truly managed” assets and most reflects the management responsibilities that advisory institutions genuinely undertake.

“Covered assets / reached assets are the easiest to be misread. As long as a client completes some form of signing or binding, the assets under the client’s name may be counted even if they have not purchased an advisory strategy or have not been included in portfolio management.” Luo Ronghua said. This definition is more like a “potential service pool” and should not be directly equated with the true advisory scale.

Between “assets under management” and “covered” are “signed asset scale,” which targets assets included within the scope of advisory services after clients sign wealth management advisory agreements. Different institutions may treat “whether strategies are actually executed after signing, and how the unexecuted portion is handled” differently, so comparability is weaker than “assets under management / custody.”

In addition, Luo Ronghua said that some advisory institutions may use the number of service clients—especially the number of high-net-worth clients—to represent their scale, because the number of clients can demonstrate their market coverage, service breadth, and market position.

From the regulator’s perspective, both Tian Lihui and Luo Ronghua said that the regulatory authorities mainly use the “service asset scale” definition of fund wealth management advisory.

For example, on the CSRC website, it has disclosed that as of July 2021, fund wealth management advisory service assets had exceeded 50 billion yuan, and service investors were about 2.5 million accounts; as of March 2023, fund wealth management advisory service assets were 146.4 billion yuan, with a total of 5.24 million customers.

It is understood that in 2021, the Asset Management Association of China issued the “Public Fund Investment Advisor Business Data Submission Interface Specification.” In that document, advisory scale uses “signed customers’ signed fund wealth management advisory service amount” as the calculation basis, meaning it includes the asset scale corresponding to fund trading accounts opened for accepting advisory services as agreed in advisory service agreements, including both managed and non-managed scale.

Will institutions selectively disclose and exaggerate their scale?

Although from the regulator’s perspective, the overall statistical definition for advisory scale is clear and explicit, due to the lack of unified disclosure standards, some institutions’ advisory scale disclosures in the market are not without “self-stated” cases.

“Currently, the industry’s mainstream core definition and the regulatory definition both focus on publicly offered fund portfolios managed on a delegated basis, and do not include non-portfolio distribution scale or customers’ total funds in accounts. But when different institutions disclose scale externally, there indeed are cases where their definitions differ.” Tian Xuan, a professor with a Distinguished Professorship at Peking University, said that some institutions count idle funds in clients’ fully delegated accounts that have not been included in advisory portfolios, or accounts that only provide advisory suggestions without actually rebalancing, into AUM (asset management scale), leading to statistical distortion. Other institutions package historical transaction data from non-signed clients into “potential AUM,” blurring the real boundaries of service.

Tian Lihui also believes that when different institutions disclose information, there is indeed a phenomenon of selectively using definitions. For example, mixing traditional distribution or asset management scale under full delegation into advisory scale to some extent exaggerates the actual service boundaries.

“During the industry’s rapid expansion, there may be cases where different institutions’ external disclosure definitions are not unified, and even cases where service scale is exaggerated. The main reason is the confusion between advisory scale and distribution scale. When some institutions publicize externally, they may package traditional distribution holdings into advisory service scale.” Xiao Wen, Chairwoman of Yimi Fund, emphasized that a true buy-side wealth management advisory needs a clear advisory service agreement and fee mechanism, not merely product sales.

Luo Ronghua said that the risk of selective adoption of definitions or exaggerating scale does exist. If an institution only discloses “covered assets / signed assets” externally, without simultaneously disclosing “true assets under management / custody size” and the execution ratio, outsiders may overestimate how well the advisory has been implemented. Therefore, a more prudent disclosure approach should be to provide at least two sets of numbers at the same time: true assets under management / custody size; the proportion of signed assets actually executed under advisory strategies, and clearly specify the statistical method and time points.

“The scale statistics of buy-side wealth management advisory should return to the essence of service. The core reason for the current confusion of industry definitions is treating product scale as service scale, but the two are fundamentally different: product scale is the ‘aggregation of funds,’ while service scale is the ‘reflection of professional capability.’” Xu Haining, Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Shanghai ZhiHui Technology, said plainly that the true scale of a buy-side wealth management advisory should focus on the core business of “full delegation, professional services, and customers paying for services,” not on simply piling up funds.

Related data obtained by China Business News show that as of the end of 2024, Yimi Fund’s existing scale was 39.858 billion yuan, and Ant Wealth Advisory was 27.3 billion yuan, ranking first and second respectively; among brokerages, the top-ranking were Huatai Securities (18.079 billion yuan), CICC Wealth (17.376 billion yuan), and Orient Securities (15.371 billion yuan); among the public fund-related group, the top was Southern Fund (8.79 billion yuan).

Also, according to Yimi Fund data, as of the end of 2025, its advisory scale exceeded 51 billion yuan. Huatai Securities’ 2025 interim report shows that as of the end of June 2025, the scale of the fund advisory business was 21.037 billion yuan.

Meanwhile, from mid-2025 to early 2026, more and more brokerages have disclosed that their advisory assets under custody have surpassed one trillion yuan, even reaching several hundreds of billions beyond that.

Professional analysts believe that “one-trillion-scale” data, besides including components of distribution, may also use “cumulative balances” instead of “current custody balances.”

“‘Custody balance’ refers to the current scale of clients who still choose your service; ‘cumulative balance’ adds up all the balances from several prior years. If this figure is described as ‘custody balance,’ the scale naturally becomes larger.” The aforementioned source disclosed that in fact, according to the regulatory reporting definition, the total advisory business scale across the entire market is roughly in the range of 200-plus billion yuan, i.e., over 200 billion yuan.

So the question is: with these “inflated” figures in the market, is the regulator completely unaware? Why was no intervention made?

“Given the regulator’s sensitivity, it shouldn’t be unaware. As for why there was no intervention or stance, it may still be to protect an industry whose growth is not easy to achieve. The difficulty of transformation is well known. Institutions taking steps to transform is better than having no action at all. Guiding more institutions to join the transformation is also good for the industry.” The aforementioned source speculated.

What differences in business logic lie behind the differences in rankings?

Due to the existence of different definitions and some institutions’ selective disclosures, the scale rankings of leading fund wealth management advisory institutions show significant differentiation. What is even more worth attention is that behind differences in rankings there are differences in business logic among different types of institutions.

“Significant differences in ranking are a mirror of differences in business models.” Tian Lihui said that if ranked by the narrow definition of fund wealth management advisory scale, some internet third-party platforms that focus on the “advisory service fee” model and have strategy neutrality lead in scale. If ranked by the broader definition of signed asset scale, top brokers with strong comprehensive capabilities and large client bases are at the top.

“This reflects that securities firms are stronger in comprehensive asset allocation, third parties are better at online services and neutral strategies, while banks and public funds are still exploring the best paths that combine their own traditional advantages with innovation,” Tian Lihui said.

Tian Xuan believes that if only the AUM of advisory portfolios actually delegated by signed clients is counted, securities firms tend to rank near the top thanks to their advantages in trading systems and a base of high-net-worth clients. If “the total value of advisory advice coverage for clients’ assets” is included, then because of the massive retail client base and the funds that remain in accounts, banks jump to the number one position. Public funds are constrained by channel dependence and non-full-delegation characteristics, so their scale rankings are generally lower. Third parties, under the definition of “AUM of actively rebalancing clients,” perform outstandingly.

“This difference in ranking essentially reflects the fundamental split in business models among institutions of different types,” said Tian Xuan.

“For most ordinary investors, wealth management ultimately can adopt a full-delegation model. This model can more completely implement the asset allocation理念, reduce behavioral biases caused by clients’ frequent interventions, and help form standardized portfolio management and a unified risk-control system, thereby improving long-term execution efficiency and performance stability. At the same time, it also aligns more with the buy-side wealth management advisory logic oriented toward delegated responsibility.” Hu Conghui, Vice Dean of the School of Economics and Business Administration at Beijing Normal University, said that full delegation is more suitable for client groups with more mature wealth management awareness over the long term, and at the current stage often needs to be transitioned and complemented with advisory-based services.

“If advisory services and the sale of proprietary products are deeply bound together, scale statistics are more likely to be ‘made bigger,’ but they also more easily trigger external doubts about the independence of buy-side advisors.” Luo Ronghua said. “The more the model is portfolio-oriented and the more it emphasizes ongoing rebalancing and retention of service records, the closer it is to ‘truly managed.’ Conversely, if it is mainly consultation/advice, scale may not be large, but that does not mean the service has no value.”

Xiao Wen said that by the “fund wealth management advisory signed total scale” definition, brokers lead first in total volume thanks to advantages in high-net-worth clients and offline teams; third parties catch up fastest through more inclusive and standardized advisory offerings. By the “full delegation / segregated account scale” definition, brokers are the largest, while third parties and public fund-related entities are clearly smaller. Full delegation has a high threshold and is oriented toward high-net-worth customization—traditional areas of advantage for brokers and banks—while third parties basically do not focus on high-threshold segregated accounts. By the “number of service clients” definition, third parties have a dominant advantage in the long-tail retail market due to low thresholds, fully online presence, and strong companionship—using customer counts to support the industry’s basic base.

In Xiao Wen’s view, differences in statistical data are essentially the result of different emphases of different types of institutions on the balance between “invest” and “advise.” Brokers tend to promote managed advisory services; the proportion of this kind of asset in the advisory scale of leading brokers is extremely high. Its core logic is to make rebalancing decisions through authorized delegation to improve risk control and trading agility. Public-fund advisory has a strong “imprint” on the asset side; in portfolio construction, some public-fund advisors may show a preference for allocating their own proprietary products. Third-party institutions rely on service-driven operations, adhering to an “open architecture” and “three parts investing, seven parts advising,” with scale growth depending more on refined operations on the liability side.

“Behind the ranking differences is a ‘difference in business logic.’” Xu Haining said that third-party institutions treat buy-side wealth management advisory as their only business model. They build resource matching around clients’ needs. Customer experience determines how much they retain, and advisory services determine customer experience. This positive feedback loop is smoother. Among traditional financial institutions, top broker licenses resources are so abundant that they may become less sensitive; legacy burdens on inventory reduce transformation motivation. In contrast, mid-sized brokerages are more active and outperform some large brokerages.

What disadvantages are brought by vague statistical definitions?

All interviewed sources agreed that ambiguous scale statistical definitions and unclear disclosure standards for wealth management advisory will bring negative impacts to investors and to industry development.

“Investors may mistake ‘covered assets / signed assets’ as ‘true assets under management,’ thereby misjudging an institution’s capability, and then choosing an advisory institution that does not suit their needs,” Luo Ronghua said.

Xu Haining also believed that confusion in definitions may prevent investors from genuinely comparing different institutions’ service capabilities, making them easily misled by “inflated scale,” making rational choices difficult, and even causing a trust crisis in the wealth management advisory industry if scale does not match actual service.

For the wealth management advisory industry itself, Tian Lihui said that ambiguous definitions may push the industry into a “scale-number game,” rather than an abnormal competition focused on improving “the health of customer accounts.”

“Some institutions, in order to enhance market visibility and competitiveness, may engage in unfair competition through methods such as inflating scale or exaggerating performance, leading to ‘bad money driving out good.’ This will harm the industry’s long-term healthy development,” Tian Xuan said.

“With no unified yardstick, the industry is prone to a distorted competition of ‘comparing definitions and chasing empty volume.’ Some institutions expand apparent scale by adjusting statistical definitions, while ignoring core indicators such as customer profitability, long-term holding, and service quality. This will force institutions that truly focus on pure buy-side service to passively follow suit, fully distorting the industry’s value orientation,” Xiao Wen said.

In Xiao Wen’s view, unifying the scale statistical definition for wealth management advisory is a must-pass checkpoint as the industry shifts from extensive expansion toward standardized maturity, and it is also a foundation-industry infrastructure problem that must be solved to cross into a high-quality stage. “Only when statistical standards become transparent can the industry shift from ‘who runs faster’ to ‘who holds steady,’ truly connecting the ‘last mile’ from fund product returns to customer account returns,” Xiao Wen said.

How should disclosure move toward unity and transparency?

Xiao Wen recommended that the CSRC, the industry association, and wealth management advisory institutions each do their own part and advance in coordination. Specifically, the CSRC, as the top-level rule maker and supervisor, should establish compliance bottom lines for statistical work and enforce mandatory requirements. The Asset Management Association of China, as the executor of standards implementation, should formulate detailed accounting rules, data submission standards, and unified disclosure templates. Meanwhile, all licensed wealth management advisory institutions should strictly report data according to the unified definitions and standardize their marketing disclosures.

On the concrete implementation path, Xiao Wen said that first, it is necessary to clearly distinguish the pure fund wealth management advisory assets under custody, high-net-worth fully delegated segregated account scale, and traditional fund distribution holdings scale, thereby eliminating from the root cause “data mixing and inflating scale.” It should clearly define “wealth management advisory service assets”: only assets corresponding to fund trading accounts opened to accept wealth management advisory services as agreed in advisory service agreements should be counted toward pure buy-side advisory scale, distinguishing them from traditional fund sales.

Second, unified accounting rules should be established to squeeze out “scale water.” Clarify key accounting principles: only count the asset management scale that clients sign up for, excluding product lead-generation / routing scale; when selecting products across the market and configuring proprietary products, apply the same definition and same standards for accounting.

Finally, build an official unified disclosure platform. Xiao Wen suggested that the industry association should establish a dedicated information disclosure column for wealth management advisory data. Institutions should periodically and truthfully disclose, and scale must be published simultaneously with buy-side indicators such as number of customers, average holding duration, and customer profitability proportions—so that scale is linked to service quality.

Tian Lihui also believed that establishing unified standards requires coordination among the regulator, industry associations, and leading institutions. On the specific path, it can be divided into three steps: first, the industry association should lead, based on core elements of “client authorization—advisory services—continuous management,” to define and publish accounting guidance. Second, in regulatory systems such as broker classification evaluation, “fund wealth management advisory scale” should use a unified definition to grant points, creating policy incentives. Third, encourage leading institutions to disclose according to the new definitions first, and simultaneously publish quality indicators such as customer counts and profitability ratios. Through market selection that forces the rest of the industry to follow, ultimately achieving a transition from “scale orientation” to “value orientation.”

“Regulatory leadership is needed, industry association coordination, and institution participation, to form a closed loop of ‘top-level design—standard formulation—implementation—supervision and evaluation.’” Xu Haining said. It is necessary to clarify the statistical boundaries of buy-side wealth management advisory scale, excluding funds that are not fully delegated or not professional services. At the same time, institutions should proactively practice the principle of “truthful disclosure,” not exaggerate or mislead, and jointly maintain the industry’s credibility.

Luo Ronghua suggested establishing a framework of “three-tier definitions + mandatory disclosure items.” The first tier is the core definition that must be disclosed, i.e., true assets under management / advisory assets under custody scale. It should clarify which assets are included, whether execution of strategies is required, and whether rebalancing with service records is required. The second tier is an auxiliary definition: it can be disclosed, but must be accompanied by supporting disclosures—i.e., when disclosing signed assets, also disclose the “proportion of assets with actual executed strategies.” The third tier is the marketing definition: it may allow disclosure of covered assets / reached assets, but it must be clearly stated that it is “not the same as assets under management.”

Among them, the regulator is responsible for defining the bottom line, especially the core definitions that must be disclosed. The industry association coordinates different institutions to push for widely accepted scale statistical indicators. Wealth management advisory institutions should disclose relevant data on time and accurately.

“In addition, to ensure effective implementation of the standards, two supporting systems should be established at the same time: unified audit / sampling inspection rules to prevent unexecuted strategy assets from being counted as ‘assets under management’; and unified disclosure time points and frequency to avoid selective disclosure of ‘the best-looking day.’” Luo Ronghua said.

Tian Xuan suggested that the regulator should organize industry experts and representatives of institutions to jointly research and formulate the “Scale Statistics Specification for Buy-Side Wealth Management Advisory Institutions,” clarifying the AUM statistical boundaries, calculation time points, valuation methods, and principles of attribution of clients’ assets. At the same time, a unified information disclosure platform should be established, requiring all institutions to regularly upload audited scale data for disclosure. In addition, supervision and inspection of wealth management advisory institutions’ scale statistics and information disclosure should be strengthened, and serious action should be taken against any violations found.

Xiao Wen said that regulators are currently also strengthening relevant norms. The “Guidelines for Publicly Offered Securities Investment Fund Performance Comparison Benchmark,” which the CSRC will publish in January 2026 and implement starting March, is intended to guide the industry to establish unified and transparent evaluation standards and prevent misleading statements.

Looking ahead for the wealth management advisory industry, Xiao Wen believes that indicators such as client re-subscription rates and average holding duration will become more important quality indicators than simple scale rankings. In the future, the deciding factor in scale competition will also focus on who can truly exercise well the “managed” authorization, efficiently converting the growth of product net asset values into the actual returns earned by customers’ accounts.

Xu Haining emphasized that buy-side wealth management advisory is an important, even strategic, lever for deepening capital market reforms. “The true ‘No. 1’ should not be the institution with the largest scale, but the institution that provides the best service and is most recognized by customers. Ultimately, industry competition will return to the essence of service.”

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