SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 14, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Callan, a leading institutional investment consulting firm, announced the release of its 2025 Investment Management Fee Study—its 11th examination of what institutional investors pay for asset management.
The study provides a detailed analysis of fee levels and trends across multiple asset classes and mandate sizes for active and passive management, covering 23 asset classes. The results offer insight into what institutional investors are actually paying (negotiated fees) versus investment managers’ published fee schedules.
“We’re seeing continued pressure on actual fees paid for active management, but the pace of fee compression seems to be slowing, and may be approaching a practical lower limits for quality institutional products in some asset classes,” said Ivan “Butch” Cliff, study author and Callan’s director of research.
The data was collected and curated using Callan’s proprietary investment manager database, actual client fee schedules, and proprietary client performance reporting database. The study reflects trends on 2024 fees representing $784 billion in assets under management (AUM) and $1.9 billion in total fees paid. The firm’s fee database includes mandates run by ~329 investment firms and ~180 institutional investors.
Study’s Key Findings
- 97% of total fees paid were to active managers (down 1% from our last study in 2023)
- 61% of total assets were managed actively (down 1% from 2023)
- 50% of total active fees went to 11% of the investment management firms
- Highest average basis point fees went to hedge fund-of-funds (113 bps) and private real assets (88 bps)
- The lowest went to passive U.S. large cap (1.9 bps) and U.S. small cap (3.1 bps)
- Fee resilience was strongest for private real assets, hedge fund-of-funds, global ex-U.S. equity, and emerging equity
- Fee weakness affected core-plus fixed income, U.S. smid/small/macro, high yield/bank loans, and emerging debt
- Passive usage in U.S. smid/small/micro cap equity increased 6% from 2023 to 29%, while passive usage for core fixed Income increased 2% to 47%. Meanwhile, passive usage decreased slightly for both U.S. large cap equity (-3% to 70%) and Global ex-U.S. equity (-1% to 41%).
- Separate accounts were the most popular investment vehicle by far (54% of products)
- Public funds had the largest share of AUM by percent of mandates (34%) and percent of assets (50%)
Find the summary blog post and study here.
About Callan
Callan was founded as an employee-owned investment consulting firm in 1973. Ever since, we have empowered institutional clients with creative, customized investment solutions backed by proprietary research, exclusive data, and ongoing education. Today, Callan advises clients with more than $3 trillion in total assets, which makes it among the largest independently owned investment consulting firms in the U.S. Callan uses a client-focused consulting model to serve pension and defined contribution plan sponsors, endowments, foundations, independent investment advisers, investment managers, and other asset owners. Callan has six offices throughout the U.S. Learn more at callan.com.
Media Contact:
Elizabeth Anathan
mediarelations@callan.com
415-274-3020
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SOURCE Callan LLC
