RIAs rebuilt ETF lineups on momentum, not structure

Advisors ended the second quarter holding more ETFs than ever, and they aimed the new positions at the narrowest part of the market. The average RIA firm held 92.9 ETFs at the end of June, up from 88.4 in March, and 63.4% of firms added funds while only 18.2% trimmed, according to AdvizorPro's Q2 2026 RIA ETF Trends report, first reported by ETF Trends. The gap between buyers and sellers widened from the roughly 2-to-1 split in the first quarter to better than 3-to-1.

Portfolio turnover held at 11.6%, down just 70 basis points from the first quarter's 12.3%. Advisors added positions equal to 13.9% of their existing ETF holdings and dropped 8.7%, producing a net gain of nearly 25,000 positions across the 5,398 RIAs tracked in both quarters. That broad buying reached every corner of the issuer table: all 10 of the largest ETF issuers gained RIA relationships in the quarter, a reversal from the first quarter when the biggest names barely moved or lost ground. iShares continues to lead with 4,991 RIA relationships, State Street follows at 4,737, and Vanguard is third at 4,599, while Invesco posted the largest gain among the top 10, adding 95 net relationships.

Technology added 230 net RIA relationships, the most of any Morningstar category, while the commodities-focused category lost 103 and digital assets lost 86, flipping the first quarter, when real-asset funds led the category rankings. The single funds at the top of the table sharpen the point: the iShares Semiconductor ETF (SOXX) gained 206 RIA relationships, the VanEck Semiconductor ETF (SMH) added 205, and the State Street Technology Select Sector SPDR (XLK) added 194, with AI funds close behind.

EntrepreneurShares grew its RIA base 115.6%, the fastest of any issuer with at least 50 advisor relationships in the first quarter, and nearly all of it came from one fund, the ERShares Private-Public Crossover ETF (XOVR), which blends public stocks with private holdings including SpaceX. XOVR roughly doubled its advisor base from 90 to 194 firms. Baron Capital grew 83.3%, ProcureAM grew 72.4% on the strength of the Procure Space ETF (UFO), and the iShares International Country Rotation Active ETF (CORO) posted the second-fastest growth among individual funds, climbing from 197 advisors to 364, an 84.8% jump.

Together, those growth figures describe an RIA shelf rebuilt on momentum, not structure. A category flip from real assets to tech is a rotation rather than an expansion, and a net gain of 25,000 positions is small next to the gross churn behind it; turnover of 11.6% points to a channel making active calls with passive instruments. The shelf is absorbing whatever is newest—a SpaceX-linked crossover fund, a country-rotation active ETF—while the categories that ran ahead just three months ago get cleared out.

The semiconductor trade has been productive, and XOVR's blend of private and public exposure is a genuine product innovation. Still, the data records a channel chasing; the report tracks relationships, so position sizes are unverified, but the direction is unambiguous.

Last week, Invesco's RSP crossed $100 billion as a wager on equal weight; this quarter's RIA data is the opposite wager, a vote for the most concentrated slices of the market. As this publication argued at the crossing, equal weight becomes a core allocation when concentration gets extreme. The RIA channel just added to the extreme.

The risk is visible in the first quarter's own reversal: real-asset funds led the category rankings in Q1, and the advisors who bought them spent Q2 selling them. If the semiconductor trade follows the same arc, the SOXX and SMH relationships added in the second quarter will be the first trims in the fourth. Broadcom's bear market is a reminder that the chip trade can turn faster than a quarterly report can capture. The RIA shelf has become a momentum scoreboard, and momentum scoreboards reset every quarter; issuers that won this distribution battle should already be planning the rotation out, because the same advisors who made room for chips made room for real assets last quarter and will make room for whatever wins next quarter.