While it was somewhat of a bounce back year for the U.S. economy and markets, the turbulence of 2023 further validated the role of a trusted financial advisor. The U.S. economy saw moderate growth during the year despite ongoing challenges that lingered from the pandemic. While inflation abated and labor markets cooled, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates. Tech stocks—notably, the “Magnificent 7”—continued to drive market gains, although concerns over regulatory scrutiny and valuable bubbles persisted. Geopolitical tensions drove market volatility throughout the year, while renewable energy sectors gained traction as investors increased their focus on sustainability.

Amid the roller-coaster of news headlines ranging from banking collapses to tightening job markets and the rise of Artificial Intelligence, investors looked to their advisors to help them make sense of all the ups and downs. In turn, advisors looked to AssetMark to support them in taking care of their clients.

AssetMark’s role as a valued and trusted partner, expertly guiding advisors and their clients through volatile markets and helping them adapt to the ever-changing landscape, is at the center of everything we do—in 2023 and always. At our core, we are a mission-driven company, and our dedicated team of 1,000 employees comes to work every day to advance our purpose of making a difference in the lives of advisors and their clients. Because when our advisors and their clients succeed, AssetMark succeeds.

2023 Highlights

AssetMark had another historic y year in 2023, highlighted by strong top- and bottom-line growth metrics.

When I stepped into the Chief Executive Officer role in September 2023, AssetMark was already on a strong growth trajectory. We continued that momentum through the rest of the year, and I’m proud and humbled to report that 2023 was another milestone year for AssetMark, with record financial growth and a 72 Net Promoter Score (NPS), the highest in our company’s history.

We ended the year with a record $109 billion of platform assets. We served an all-time high 254,000 investor households through relationships with more than 9,300 independent financial advisors, of which over 3,100 are engaged. The company’s full-year net revenue was a record $545 million, an increase of 20% year-over-year due to our diverse and complementary revenue streams. Our disciplined approach to expense management facilitated an adjusted EBITDA margin expansion of over 260 basis points. For the year, adjusted EBITDA was $250 million, an increase of 25% year-over-year. Adjusted net income available to common shareholders was $171 million, 31% higher compared to fiscal 2022.

In 2023, we also advanced our expansion into adjacent channels—particularly within the Registered Investment Advisors (“RIA”) channel with the integration of Adhesion Wealth and the Bank Trust segment through our partnership with Accutech Cheetah. Our collaboration with Accutech Cheetah, a cloud-based trust accounting system, addresses the emerging intersection of bank trust services and investment services with a digital ecosystem that sets both institutional wealth managers and RIAs up for success.

Year of the Advisor

Mission-driven with advisors at the center

At AssetMark, our Mission is simple: Make a difference in the lives of advisors and their clients. We achieve that by remaining laser-focused on our Vision and Strategy. In 2023, we refined and simplified our strategy to its essence: Empower advisor growth by offering flexible and integrated technology, exceptional service and consulting, and compelling wealth solutions.

I want to share some highlights and moments I’m particularly proud of from the year in our three strategic focus areas.

Flexible, fully integrated technology

Independent financial advisors and their teams are often faced with a multitude of marketing, administrative, and business management tasks. We offer a compelling solution that fully integrates leading third-party technology solutions into our core proprietary technology and helps advisors perform these tasks. Our investment was highlighted in 2023 by the addition of several technology initiatives. The growing demand for on-the-go access to key account insights and important investment portfolio-related dashboards led to the creation of AssetMark Mobile, which offers a sleek and intuitive digital interface that improves the investment journey for advisors and clients in real-time. A combination of recent eWealthManager digital enhancements provides a more seamless experience for advisors and their clients, including straight-through processing, delivery of tax forms and other key account documents, same-day trading for investment solution changes, and the introduction of Multifactor Authentication (MFA) and stricter password protocol requirements for enhanced security measures.

Exceptional service and consulting

Providing advisors with access to high-quality service is a critical component of our value proposition. We develop deep, multilevel relationships with advisors and their teams and tailor our services to ensure they can connect with AssetMark at all levels. New offerings in areas like tax management, investment consulting, and wealth management speak to what our advisors are looking for and empower them to better serve their client’s needs. The recent launch of our Investment Consulting Services is all about offering personalized, customized, and exclusive experiences while letting the advisor stay in control. Our popular On-Demand Video Series provides increased insights from our top investment experts.

Compelling wealth solutions

Extensive planning efforts throughout 2023 culminated with the successful early access pilot phase for our new Tax Management Services (TMS), an exciting new offering with personalized and comprehensive tax solutions that unlock even greater tax efficiencies for advisors. Debuting officially in January 2024, TMS is driven by strong advisor demand for a top-tier tax management solution with a comprehensive suite of services, including tax transition, tax-efficient rebalancing, tax loss harvesting, and client-directed activity. The addition of First Trust Investment Strategies to the AssetMark platform, one of the industry’s largest actively managed exchange-traded fund (ETF) providers and innovators, is another proof point in our ongoing journey to provide advisors access to innovative products and services to help them best serve the evolving needs of their clients.

Road Map for Success

With growth and inflation expected to slow in 2024, significant trends continue to impact our industry, such as the consolidation of broker-dealer firms, previous and potential future acquisitions, aging advisor demographics and succession planning, challenges surrounding advisor recruiting efforts, and general organic growth. Although change is inevitable, AssetMark is well poised for the future and plans to rise to the occasion with major projects and initiatives in play for 2024 that will set up our advisors—and the clients they serve—for continued success. These plans are aimed at expanding our suite of cutting-edge solutions and personalized consulting services, including the game-changing launch in 2024 of our Tax Management Services offering and enhancements to the advisor digital experience through the modernization of eWealthManager with our new Advisor Dashboard, which will create a faster, more flexible, fully customizable, and more intuitive experience for advisors and their clients.

Our primary goal remains to deepen our relationships with advisors and empower their success. To maximize this impact, we must stay dedicated to the core of our mission: serving advisors and their clients. By prioritizing advisors in all we do, we further empower them to guide their clients and confidently grow their businesses in 2024 and beyond.

I am honored to lead the company as CEO during this exciting period in AssetMark’s growth trajectory as we execute our proven strategy. That growth and success can only happen when that dedication and commitment intersect with our strong values and client-centric culture by leading with heart, integrity, excellence, and respect. By focusing on the advisor, being flexible, innovative, and driven to succeed. By delivering purpose-built solutions and personalized investor support that is designed to meet the evolving needs of independent financial advisors. We do not take lightly our leadership position in the industry. By remaining hyper-focused on our long-term strategic plan, we can deliver even more value to our advisors, clients, shareholders, and team members in the year ahead.

Thank you for joining us on this journey and for placing your continued support, trust, and confidence in AssetMark.

Michael Kim
Chief Executive Officer