How We Test
Written by investor.com
Our unbiased reviews of financial advisors at investor.com rests on three key pillars:
Hands-on data collection and testing. Our writers and researchers painstakingly collect and verify numerous data points on each financial advisor.
Expert opinion regarding where the financial advisor stands relative to its competitors. Our team is immersed in the industries we cover. We leverage decades of retirement and investment industry experience to educate readers and critically evaluate financial advisors.
The human touch. We prefer using human intelligence over AI, so you won’t get content from a bot. Our team has opinions, and we share them.
Financial advisors
Our unrivaled coverage of U.S.-based financial advisors begins with collecting extensive federal regulatory data.
- Each month, we collect publicly accessible data from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) IAPD Database. Registered investment advisory firms are required to file this information annually.
- We then filter for data points that are incorporated into our proprietary Trust Algorithm.
- The data in this set is sorted and weighted based on significance and the net impact on Americans.
- The Trust Algorithm then assigns an Overall star rating for each firm.
In this manner, we provide Americans with unbiased information on the firms they are considering trusting with their assets. All firms are listed and detailed in our searchable database.
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Explore the results of our exhaustive testing by finding a financial advisor.
About the Editorial Team
Investor.com is your trustworthy guide to the world of financial advisors. Founded in 2018 as an unbiased resource empowering consumers to research and compare financial advisory firms, investor.com today gives consumers the tools to make smart money decisions.