Morgan Stanley Fees 2026: 2.00% Cap, 0.035% Platform, Cash Sweep

Which Morgan Stanley is this page about

The firm that sends you advisory statements is Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC, listed on the SEC's adviser site as "MORGAN STANLEY" (CRD 149777, SEC file 801-70103) with "Morgan Stanley Wealth Management" among its other names. It is registered both as an investment adviser and as a broker-dealer, and its Form CRS says so in its opening paragraph. That matters for a fee question, because the same Financial Advisor can serve you through a brokerage account that pays commissions or through an advisory program that charges a percentage of assets, and the two have different costs and different conflicts.

The firm's brochures call themselves "MSWM", and the IAPD lists 12 current program brochures. Our companion piece reads 21 firms side by side and quotes one Morgan Stanley program; see how much a financial advisor costs in 2026. This page reads only Morgan Stanley, in full.

Every advisory program and what it charges

Morgan Stanley's brochures state the firm's own fee as a maximum. The table lists the programs a private client can meet. The maximum is the firm's own charge; fund expenses, outside manager fees and account fees come on top.

Four more brochures cover institutional and planning services rather than a typical retail account: the Outsourced Chief Investment Office program has a maximum asset-based fee of 1.750% (August 7, 2026); Graystone Consulting and Institutional Services print 1.25% as the maximum with full discretion (June 30 and March 30, 2026); Financial Planning Services says the maximum fee for a financial plan is generally $5,000 and adds that, effective during the first quarter of 2026, it may be up to $20,000 for certain plans (March 30, 2026); and Private Wealth Management Consulting Services says its maximum fee is generally $500,000 (March 30, 2026).

A note on names. Names you may see elsewhere, such as Access Investing or Global Investment Solutions, do not appear as separate brochures in the firm's current list of 12 on the SEC's IAPD site. The low-minimum, ETF-based program with a published fee is Core Portfolios. Some clients are served by a Morgan Stanley Virtual Advisor, a remote advisor who, per the account booklet, “is paid a base salary plus a discretionary bonus”; the fee schedule lists lower account fees for those accounts.

What the same account pays at the maximum

The table applies the brochure maximums to four round balances. It is our arithmetic on gross fees, before fund and ETF expenses, negotiated discounts and any Offset Credit.

Two readings of the table. First, the platform fee is small in dollars and fixed: $350 on $1,000,000, whatever your advisor agrees on the rest. Second, the gap between the two ends is large. At $1,000,000 the maximum CGA fee is $17,350 a year more than the Core Portfolios fee (our arithmetic), and the brochures describe different services: in CGA a Financial Advisor makes recommendations and you approve each one; in Core Portfolios the firm manages ETF models.

What is negotiable, and how the discount works

The CGA brochure states: “Fees for the CGA program are negotiable based on factors including the type and size of the account and the range of services provided by the Financial Advisor.” It also says the fee for an account may be more than the stated maximum in “special circumstances, and with the client’s agreement,” and that the 0.035% platform fee “is non-negotiable.” The firm's own fee is billed monthly in advance on the account's value at the end of the previous month; the platform fee is billed quarterly in arrears.

Discounts work breakpoint by breakpoint. The brochure says that when the fee is expressed as a schedule, “discounts, if any, are negotiated separately for each breakpoint,” that the rate is blended, and that related accounts can be grouped in a Billing Relationship so that combined assets reach lower breakpoints, but only if you and your Financial Advisor specifically agree to it.

The brochure is explicit about who gains when a fee is cut. In its words: “Therefore, Financial Advisors have a financial incentive not to reduce fees.” It adds that if the fee rate is below a certain threshold, the firm gives the advisor credit for less than the total fee, so advisors “also have a financial incentive not to reduce fees below that threshold.” That is a conflict the firm discloses, not an accusation; it explains why the discount is something you ask for.

One more waiver sits outside the advisory fee. The July 2026 fee schedule describes a Reserved fee waiver program for households with at least $2,000,000 in eligible assets and liabilities or at least $20,000 in managed fees or commissions paid in a rolling 12 months. The schedule says the firm may change or end the program at any time.

The 0.035% platform fee and the Offset Credit

The platform fee is described as paying “for the various support and administrative services we provide to maintain the platform on which your account and the Program resides.” The brochures also describe a credit that works against it. Morgan Stanley collects revenue from certain product providers, which it calls Offset Revenue, and credits it to accounts that pay the platform fee. For mutual funds, non-sweep money market funds, alternative investments and certain ETFs, that revenue is the revenue sharing, support fees and administrative services fees that the brochure lists elsewhere: revenue sharing at rates up to 0.12% a year on mutual funds and applicable ETFs (up to 0.10% on non-sweep money market funds) and 0.10% a year for mutual fund administrative services.

The credit has limits. The brochure says the amount applied to an account in a quarter is “up to the amount of the Platform Fee charged,” that the credit “is expected to vary quarter to quarter and may be less than the Platform Fee,” and that the firm “can modify or discontinue the Offset Credit amount or mechanism at any time.” If the firm stopped collecting the revenue, the credit would be $0. The credit is pooled and spread by account value, not by what each account holds. The brochure says: “As the Offset Credit is applied based on account value and not actual Investment Product holdings, accounts holding little to no Investments Products (or Investments Products that pay lessor amounts of Offset Revenue) will disproportionally benefit from the credit applied. This is generally mitigated by subjecting those accounts to the Platform Fee.” In practice the 0.035% is a charge whose net size you can only see on your statement, in the quarterly credit.

What the fee does not cover

The CGA brochure lists what the firm's fee leaves out: the management fees and expenses charged inside mutual funds, ETFs, alternative investments, unit investment trusts and annuities; mark-ups, mark-downs and dealer spreads when Morgan Stanley or an affiliate trades as principal; account establishment or maintenance fees for IRAs; account closing and transfer costs; processing fees; and third-party charges. For alternatives, the Alternative Investments brochure adds that Morgan Stanley receives an Investor Servicing Fee of up to 0.75% a year of the net asset value of certain alternatives, which it says is rebated directly to the clients invested, and that it charges 0.25% a year to report on alternatives it did not recommend or sell.

The firm's own July 2026 fee schedule gives the account-level prices.

The schedule says that “Fees listed here exclude advisory fees, commissions, commission equivalents or markups,” that some may be waived at certain asset levels, and that the firm reserves the right to discount or waive any fee at its sole discretion. An IRA fee of $125 is 0.025% of a $500,000 account (our arithmetic), small next to the advisory fee but charged in addition to it.

The commission alternative, and what it costs

A brokerage account has no asset-based advisory fee. The Form CRS describes it this way: “Full-Service Accounts: You generally pay a commission or markup/markdown (a fee added to or subtracted from the market price) each time you make a trade,” and adds that “we have an incentive to encourage you to trade more often.” The firm's account booklet, “Important Account Information for Full-Service Accounts,” dated September 2026, does not publish a commission schedule for full-service accounts. Its pages tell clients to ask their Financial Advisor about applicable commissions, so the price of a trade has to be asked for.

The CGA brochure addresses the choice directly. It says that “Clients who have a low level of trading and do not require investment advisory services may be able to obtain transaction execution at a lower cost in a brokerage account,” and, in the other direction, that a client who moves from a brokerage account to a fee-based account will generally see internal mutual fund costs fall as share classes convert to advisory share classes but “will pay an additional asset-based fee which you would not pay in a brokerages account.” The right answer depends on how much you trade and what you hold; the brochure's point is that the comparison exists.

Cash: the sweep rate table and what Morgan Stanley earns

Cash sits in two places in the fee arithmetic. First, the brochures include it in the fee base: “free credit balances and allocations to cash including assets invested in Sweep Vehicles are included in your account’s fee calculation.” Second, it is swept by default into the Bank Deposit Program, or BDP, which places it in deposit accounts at FDIC-insured banks, some of which are Morgan Stanley affiliates. For clients who cannot use the BDP, the brochure says the cash goes into money market funds managed by Morgan Stanley's affiliates.

The firm publishes the BDP rate tiers through its rate monitor, and the tiers differ sharply between brokerage and advisory accounts. This is the table as of November 13, 2026; the same rates appear on every one of the 31 days in the feed, October 14 to November 13, 2026.

What the tiers mean in dollars, assuming the tier rate applies to the whole balance and ignoring that rates change (our arithmetic): $500,000 of cash in an advisory-scheme balance at 3.85% earns $19,250 a year, while the fee on that same $500,000 at the 2.00% maximum plus 0.035% is $10,175. The same $500,000 in a brokerage-scheme balance at 0.05% earns $250 a year, and $100,000 at 0.01% earns $10. These are illustrations of the table, not a statement about what any client earns: tiers are set on the value of total BDP balances for the household, and the firm says the rates for advisory and brokerage deposits are separate.

For context, the firm's rate monitor also lists the money market funds that receive cash from accounts that cannot use the BDP. On November 12, 2026 their current seven-day yields were 3.59% (Morgan Stanley U.S. Government Money Market Trust), 3.53% (MSILF Government Securities Portfolio), 3.84% (MSILF Government Portfolio, institutional class) and 3.54% (Cayman Sweep Fund). Money market funds are not FDIC insured, and yields move daily.

What does Morgan Stanley earn on swept cash? The brochure answers in its own words, and the answer has several parts:

• The Morgan Stanley Sweep Banks “will pay MSWM an annual account-based flat fee for the services performed by MSWM with respect to BDP.” The brochure does not state the amount. It does say MSWM receives no cash compensation or credits on BDP assets in Retirement Accounts, and that the Financial Advisor receives no part of these fees or credits.
• The sweep banks earn a spread. The brochure says “the Morgan Stanley Sweep Banks have the opportunity to earn income on the BDP assets through lending activity, and that income is usually significantly greater than the fees MSWM earns on affiliated Money Market Funds,” and that this gives Morgan Stanley “a conflict of interest in connection with BDP being the default Sweep Vehicle, rather than an eligible Money Market Fund.”
• Rates are at the banks' discretion. “The Morgan Stanley Sweep Banks have discretion in setting the interest rates paid on deposits received through BDP, and are under no legal or regulatory requirement to maximize those interest rates,” and “the lower the amount of interest paid to customers, the greater is the ‘spread’ earned by the Morgan Stanley Sweep Banks.”
• The brochure's own summary of the rate: “Generally, the rate you will earn on BDP will be lower than the rate on other cash alternatives.”
• If cash sweeps to a money market fund, the brochure says Morgan Stanley's compensation from such funds ranges from 0.10% to 0.25% a year, but that “we either rebate to clients or do not receive compensation on sweep Money Market Fund positions held in our fee-based advisory account programs.”
• Outside the advisory fee, the firm's account booklet says Morgan Stanley may retain, as compensation, “your account’s proportionate share of any interest earned on aggregate cash balances held by Morgan Stanley or an affiliate with respect to assets awaiting investment,” generally at the prevailing Federal Funds interest rate.

For a reader with a seven-figure portfolio, the useful fact is that the advisory table and the brokerage table are different, and that cash in either is not free: the fee is charged on advisory cash, and the rate paid depends on the tier.

How the Financial Advisor is paid

The firm's account booklet says a Financial Advisor receives a portion of the fees and commissions as gross revenue credits, and that “the incentive compensation credit rate has varying thresholds which range from 20% to 55.5%,” with part awarded as deferred compensation. Advisors can also earn bonuses based on gross revenue, net asset inflows, clients' margin and lending balances and mortgages closed. On margin and certain other loans, the booklet says advisors are credited with gross revenue for up to 65 basis points of the loan balance.

The brochures add conflicts specific to advisory accounts. The CGA brochure says the rate of compensation paid to advisors on program accounts “may be higher than the rate we pay Financial Advisors with respect to transaction-based brokerage accounts,” so the advisor has “a financial incentive to recommend the CGA program instead of other MSWM programs or services.” It also says the revenue sharing and administrative fees are not paid to advisors, and that advisors receive no additional compensation for recommending proprietary or affiliated alternative investments. For the Bank Deposit Program, the Bank Deposit Program Disclosure Statement dated June 2025 says an advisor can receive credit of up to 0.15% of the average daily deposit balance on brokerage deposits, and that advisors do not receive those credits for investment advisory accounts.

If the product you are considering is a Morgan Stanley fund, see how the firm's own vehicles read in our pages on the Morgan Stanley private markets fund tender results and the North Haven Net REIT review.

Size and regulatory record

The firm's Form ADV Part 1, filed November 4, 2026, gives the scale.

The brochures report a larger number for a different measure: client assets in all advisory programs were $2,744,269,559,955 on December 31, 2025, of which $1,434,514,399,680 was discretionary, and the brochures say they are calculated with a different method from the regulatory assets reported in Part 1. One brochure, for Private Wealth Management Consulting Services, prints a non-discretionary figure of $1,130,755,160,275, which differs from the $1,309,755,160,275 in the other brochures and does not add to the total printed; we use the figure that adds up.

Item 11 asks about the firm, all its employees and all its affiliates together, so a Yes there does not say whom an event involved. Part 1 attaches disclosure reporting pages; most concern individuals and we do not describe them. FINRA BrokerCheck, the record at the firm level, lists 66 regulatory events, 119 arbitration awards and 85 disclosures from non-registered control affiliates. Of the 66 events, 38 were initiated by FINRA, 11 by the SEC, 3 by the CFTC, 1 by NYSE MKT and 13 by states or other bodies (our count). The latest in the list was initiated on December 9, 2024.

The SEC orders from 2017 to 2020 and 2024 record that the firm consented without admitting or denying the findings; in the September 27, 2022 order the respondents admitted the facts, and in the February 2017 order the brochure says the firm “admitted to certain facts.” FINRA and state settlements on the list were also made without admitting or denying. The CGA brochure's own disciplinary section lists five orders: January 13, 2017 ($13,000,000), February 14, 2017 ($8,000,000), June 29, 2018 ($3,600,000), May 12, 2020 ($5,000,000) and December 9, 2024 ($15,000,000). The 2022 orders and the FINRA matters are broker-dealer matters that appear on BrokerCheck and not in that list.

What changed in the latest brochure

The Consulting Group Advisor brochure dated November 4, 2026 (IAPD version 1063268) replaces the one dated March 30, 2026 (version 1033575). Its Item 2 says “No material changes.” We compared the two. The fee figures are the same: 2.00% maximum, 0.035% platform fee, non-negotiable, and the $10,000 minimum. The November version adds a paragraph on interval funds and tender offer funds, which says they offer liquidity only through periodic repurchase offers and that requests may be prorated if they exceed the amount offered, and adds a sentence to the alternatives section saying these funds involve layered fees and “in some cases, performance-based compensation.” The March version listed a June 2016 SEC settlement of $1,000,000 in its disciplinary section; the November version does not. The Form CRS effective October 23, 2026 carries its own summary of changes: from the fourth quarter of 2026 Morgan Stanley says it will facilitate transactions in securities of privately held companies through an EquityZen channel, with EquityZen Securities LLC integrating into Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC effective on or about December 1, 2026.

What a client can do with this

This is a checklist built from the firm's own documents. It is not advice on whether to stay, leave or change programs.

1. Find out which program you are in and what your rate is. The program name is in your account agreement. Ask for the fee rate in writing and compare it with the maximum printed in that program's brochure: 2.00% for CGA, PM, Select UMA and the alternatives programs, 0.30% for Core Portfolios.
2. Turn the statement into a percentage. Take the advisory fee shown for the year, add the platform fee, and divide by the account's average value. If the result is close to 2.035%, you are paying the printed maximum.
3. Ask what the platform fee came to and what the Offset Credit was. The brochure says the credit is applied within 15 business days after the end of the previous billing quarter and may be less than the fee.
4. Check the cash. Ask how much of the account is in cash or sweep, which tier you are in, and what rate the sweep paid last month. Compare it with the rate monitor. Remember the fee is charged on that cash.
5. Ask whether a brokerage account would cost less for the way you trade, since the brochure says low-trading clients may be able to trade at lower cost there, and ask what the commission would be, because the account booklet does not print one.
6. Ask what the fund or alternative pays Morgan Stanley. Revenue sharing up to 0.12% and administrative services of 0.10% are disclosed, and the brochure says they come back to accounts as the Offset Credit; for certain alternatives an Investor Servicing Fee of up to 0.75% is disclosed, which the brochure says is rebated to the clients invested. Ask to see the credits on your statement.
7. Add up the account fees. An IRA is $125 a year ($75 with eDelivery), and a transfer out is $125 per account, per the July 2026 schedule, which can change.
8. Read Item 9 of the brochure and BrokerCheck for the firm, and look up your own Financial Advisor on BrokerCheck or the SEC's IAPD.

If you are weighing a fee of around 2% on a large account, or a move between a brokerage and a fee-based account, you can ask someone outside the firm to look at the numbers.

For how the other large firms' schedules compare, see how much a financial advisor costs, and for how advisers are paid across the SEC's registered firms, what fee-only means in the SEC filings. If your question is about real estate holdings inside an advisory account, see what an advisor costs a real estate investor.

FAQ

This is analysis of public documents, not investment, legal or tax advice.

Sources: Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC Form ADV Part 2A brochures on the SEC's IAPD (CRD 149777): Consulting Group Advisor, Portfolio Management and Institutional Cash Advisory, Alternative Investments, Select UMA, separate managed account wrap and commission-based (all November 4, 2026), Outsourced Chief Investment Office (August 7, 2026), Graystone Consulting (June 30, 2026), Private Wealth Management Consulting Services, Financial Planning Services, Core Portfolios and Institutional Services (all March 30, 2026) and the prior Consulting Group Advisor brochure (March 30, 2026); Form ADV Part 1 (filed November 4, 2026); Form CRS (effective October 23, 2026); Morgan Stanley's Schedule of Miscellaneous Account and Service Fees (July 2026), Important Account Information for Full-Service Accounts (09/2026), Bank Deposit Program Disclosure Statement (June 2025), and the rate monitor data feeds retrieved November 13, 2026; FINRA BrokerCheck firm report, retrieved November 13, 2026; SEC administrative orders Release Nos. 34-101842, 34-95924, 34-95832, 34-88856, 34-79794 and 33-10726. Dollar figures marked as our arithmetic are gross schedule maximums, not what any client pays.