LPL Financial (LPLA) Reports Y/Y Rise In February Metrics

LPL Financial Holdings Inc.’s (NASDAQ:LPLA) total brokerage and advisory assets of $675.6 billion at the end of February 2019 reflect improvement of 2.2% sequentially and 3.8% year over year.

Of the total brokerage and advisory assets, brokerage assets were $369.2 billion while advisory assets totaled $306.4 billion.

Further, total net new assets were an inflow of $0.9 billion in February. This included $0.2 billion of outflows from a large hybrid firm. Prior to these outflows, total net new assets were an inflow of $1.1 billion.

LPL Financial reported $30.8 billion of total client cash sweep balances, down 4.3% from the prior month but up 3.7% from February 2018. Of the total, $21.8 billion was insured cash and $4.3 billion was deposit cash while the remaining $4.7 billion was money market cash balance.

With the gradual stabilization of equity markets, trading activities are anticipated to improve. However, dismal top-line growth poses a near-term concern.

Shares of LPL Financial have rallied 26.2% over the past 12 months against 16.6% decline of the industry.

LPL Financial currently sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Performance of Other Investment Brokers

E*TRADE Financial (NASDAQ:ETFC) reported monthly market activity for February 2019. Daily Average Revenue Trades (DARTs) for the month were 298,395, up 6% from the previous month but down 10% year over year. Derivatives comprised 30% of DARTs in February.

Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. (NYSE:IBKR) released its Electronic Brokerage segment’s performance metrics for February. The segment, which deals with the clearance and settlement of trades for individual and institutional clients globally, reported a year-over-year and sequential decrease in DARTs. Total client DARTs were 824,000, down 19% from February 2018 and 3% from January 2019.

Charles Schwab (NYSE:SCHW) reported monthly activity for February 2019. Total client assets were $3.5 trillion, up 6% from the year-ago month and 2% from the prior month.

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