U.S. Bancorp Expands Wealth Offerings: Will it Drive Fee Income Growth?

U.S. Bancorp Advisors (“USBA”), a registered investment advisor and affiliate of the U.S. Bancorp USB, has launched a suite of offerings designed for individuals who are new to investing or beginning their wealth-building journey. The initiative introduces a team-based advisory service, an enhanced self-directed brokerage platform and an integrated digital investing experience, aiming to make investing more accessible while strengthening the bank’s fee-based revenue streams.

As part of the rollout, the company introduced Wealth Connect, a team-based advisory service that allows investors with at least $25,000 to work with licensed financial advisors through phone or video consultations. The service provides personalized portfolio recommendations, ongoing investment guidance, and annual portfolio reviews. By offering tailored advice and continuous engagement, the bank aims to help customers align their investment strategies with long-term financial goals. As more emerging affluent clients adopt advisory services and their portfolios grow over time, the bank can generate recurring fee income linked to asset under management (AUM) levels.

The bank has also enhanced its self-directed brokerage platform, enabling investors to trade stocks, mutual funds, and exchange-traded funds online without annual fees or commissions through the U.S. Bank website and mobile app. The platform includes margin and options trading for qualified investors and requires no minimum investment. Alongside this, it launched a next-generation investing platform that integrates banking services offered by U.S. Bank with investing capabilities from USBA across the bank’s digital ecosystem. The platform allows customers to monitor spending, saving, borrowing and investments together while tracking progress toward short-term and long-term financial goals.

Overall, the newly launched wealth-offering suite will expand USB’s fee-based advisory accounts, increasing brokerage activity, growing AUM among emerging affluent clients and enabling cross-selling of wealth management services, supporting fee revenue growth.

The recent rollout aligns with USB’s broader efforts to strengthen fee income and diversify its revenue base. In January 2026, it agreed to acquire BTIG to enhance its capital markets platform and broaden investment banking and trading capabilities. Once completed, the acquisition is expected to contribute roughly $175–$200 million in quarterly non-interest income. Earlier, in December 2021, the bank strengthened its institutional asset management capabilities through the acquisition of PFM Asset Management. In November 2021, it also enhanced its digital investing capabilities by revamping the Automated Investor robo-advisory platform to make online investing more accessible to first-time investors.

Other Financial Firms Efforts to Boost Fee Income

JPMorgan JPM and Bank of America BAC are also undertaking initiatives to strengthen fee-based revenues through wealth management and advisory services.

JPMorgan has been expanding its advisory and wealth management capabilities to boost fee income. In January 2026, it launched Special Advisory Services, providing clients access to expertise across areas such as artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, digital assets, geopolitics and sustainability, beyond traditional M&A advisory services. Earlier, in September 2025, according to a Bloomberg report on MSN, JPMorgan deployed dedicated private client bankers in high-income areas to strengthen its affluent client franchise. These initiatives are likely to support growth in the bank’s investment banking and advisory revenues, aiding fee income growth.

Similarly, Bank of America has been expanding its wealth management offerings to capture growing demand for alternative investments. In September 2025, Merrill and Bank of America Private Bank launched the Alts Expanded Access Program, providing ultra-high-net-worth clients with access to institutional-grade private market funds. The program broadens investment opportunities for wealthy clients and is expected to support advisory and investment management fees while strengthening the bank’s wealth management platform.

USB’s Price Performance & Zacks Rank

Over the past year, shares of USB have gained 25.4% compared with the industry’s 26.7% growth.

At present, USB carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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