IBD Elite 2025: Top firms for women financial advisors

Over her more than 20 years in the industry, financial advisor Nina O’Neal has seen wealth management turn into “a much more welcoming industry” for women, she said.

Despite the fact that “we have work to do, still,” in the field, the industry is trying to hire more women such as a younger advisor on O’Neal’s team who is “not going to have to fight for credibility as much” as O’Neal did when she began her career, she said. As a partner and  investment advisor with Raleigh, North Carolina-based registered investment advisory firm AIM Advisors, O’Neal is also an advisory board member with independent wealth firm Arkadios Capital and a board member of the Women’s Leadership Alliance for Financial Advisors. 

But incidents of alleged harassment or gender-based discrimination take a toll on many women — especially in light of the fact that they comprise less than a quarter of certified financial planners.

The below rankings of independent brokerages based on the percentage of advisors who are women reflect the mixture of stark statistics and best practices among wealth management firms that, unlike many of their peers, shared the gender data in their ranks. Only 18 out of the 38 firms in Financial Planning’s annual IBD Elite study disclosed that basic yet important figure. 

Independent Financial Group, Kovack Financial Network and Lincoln Investment Planning came out on top of a group that included Cambridge Investment Research, Raymond James Financial Services and Osaic. Regardless, the No. 1 firm on the list has a percentage of female advisors that isn’t likely to evoke a lot of celebrations among women.

AIM Advisors

“Overwhelmingly, it is disappointing,” said O’Neal of the continuing small number of women across the industry. “We know the problem. Where are the solutions?”

Collaborations with organizations such as the Leadership Alliance, which has about 335 members in 43 states with an average of 15 years of experience in the profession at firms like Raymond James, Merrill, Morgan Stanley and UBS, along with the steady expansion of CFP-registered planning programs at colleges and universities, could hold part of that answer. Unfortunately, the wait for more significant changes in representation could take some patience.

“I think there’s a lot of effort. It’s just going to take time,” O’Neal said. “We’re also eager just to see the needle move. It’s definitely going to be a long play.”

Despite political pushback against anything branded as “diversity, equity and inclusion” by DEI critics, firms like Arkadios, Signature Wealth Group, RightCapital, Asset-Map, Holistiplan, Nitrogen and Wealth.com are “ambassadors” and strategic business partners with the Leadership Alliance. Programming like an upcoming board meeting and networking event next month in Atlanta at the Arkadios headquarters can further support activities like its mentorships.

“We’ve got some really strong leadership,” O’Neal said. She cited “a great perk” for members who get discounts from software vendors, alongside the bigger importance of the mentorships in making a difference for the future of the profession. “It’s really in some of the relationships that we’re building together for these women, and to have a community with shared experiences.”

Scroll down the slideshow to see which companies have the largest percentage of women in their ranks of advisors. For 2024’s list, click here. Also, read the IBD Elite cover story, “How independent advisors win the AI adoption race” and check out the ranking of the 15 firms in the channel by annual revenue.

Notes: The companies are ranked below by the percentage of financial advisors who are women as of year-end 2024, as reported by the companies themselves. Financial Planning relies on each firm to state their metrics accurately. Out of the 38 participating companies in the IBD Elite study, 20 shared no data on the number of female advisors. The industry term “producing registered representative” refers to each firm’s most accurate count of financial advisors using the firm as their brokerage or RIA. “Registered representative” refers to a usually larger group of all licensed professionals.