Discretionary Managed Portfolio Services (MPS) assets have hit £208bn after strong growth of 32% year on year, according to NextWealth’s latest MPS Asset Update report.
Assets grew by £50bn in the 12 months to the end of Q1 2026, with £18bn added in the past six months.
The report said the discretionary MPS market continues to grow at a much faster pace than the broader platform market, with the former growing at 9% over the last six months versus 3% for the latter.
Quilter Wealth Select continued to dominate discretionary MPS net asset growth with a growth rate of 34% over the past year, according to the report.
Tatton, which remained in second place in terms of total MPS assets, made the top 10 net asset growth table despite de-linking £3.7bn of Perspective Group assets.
Source: NextWealth
For the first time, the report analysed the relationship between total cost and asset growth. Of the 52 DFMs evaluated, NextWealth found that firms with an average total cost below 50bps grew assets by an average of 30% over the past 12 months, while firms charging more than 50bps grew by 20% in the same period.
Asset-weighted fees declined from 0.54% to 0.49% in the year as a result of the continued growth of low-cost passive providers.
Heather Hopkins, founder and CEO of NextWealth, said: “Price continues to be a driver of growth for model portfolios. That said, price isn’t the only driver. Active portfolios have managed to maintain their market share and their pricing.
“Active portfolios make up more than one third of assets in MPS and the total cost for hybrid and passive portfolios has fallen roughly three times faster than for active in the past two years. Price is important but DFMs continue to differentiate on service and performance, as well as price.”
• Data in the report was collected through NextWealth surveys of financial advisers and employees of financial advice businesses and data provided by 59 DFMs (accurate as of 31 March), with estimated data for Timeline and Parmenion based on prior submissions, past growth rates and publicly available information.