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Despite the lull in SEC regulatory registrations for registered investment advisors during last autumn’s government shutdown, registrations skyrocketed after the agency’s doors reopened in November.
However, an analysis by AdvizorPro also indicated that the shutdown likely hindered the possibility of a record year for new RIA approvals at the agency.
After the government shutdown in early October, most SEC operations came to a halt, including agency registrations for newly established RIAs, becoming one of the most significant direct impacts of the work stoppage on advisors.
AdvizorPro data showed that only 18 new registrations occurred during the Oct. 1 to Nov. 13 shutdown window; during the same period in 2023 and 2024, new registrations totaled 123 and 153, respectively (when looking at these registrations, AdvizorPro’s analysis included all RIAs, such as those at broker/dealers or hedge funds).
When the SEC reopened, new registrations surged; from Nov. 13, 2025, through the end of the year, there were 279 new registrations. Additionally, state RIA registrations maintained a relatively steady pace during the shutdown period, at 203 (compared with 273 and 258 during the same period in 2023 and 2024, respectively).
According to AdvizorPro co-founder and Chief Product Officer Hesom Parhizkar, the shutdown didn’t suppress RIA entrepreneurial activity in the industry altogether, but merely froze the registration pipeline.
“If firm creation demand had collapsed, we would see it in both datasets. Instead, state filings kept moving while federal registrations effectively stopped,” he said. “This rebound is the smoking gun. It proves advisors weren’t hesitating. They were stuck.”
During the shutdown period, compliance officers warned advisors looking to start new firms to weigh the timing of their resignation from current employers. Additionally, the shutdown threatened to throw wrenches into long-in-the-works plans advisors had for when and how to hang their own shingle.
Before the shutdown, AdvizorPro data showed that new RIA SEC approvals totaled 1,267, representing a 15.5% increase from the same period in 2024 (in AdvizorPro’s analysis on RIA approval data, it excised what it deemed ‘non-practicing’ RIAs, such as hedge funds, b/ds and asset managers with RIA registrations).
The firm projected that if the agency had maintained the same pace, it would have broken the SEC’s record for RIA approvals in a single year, at 1,549 in 2012 (the commission changed its AUM thresholds that year, resulting in firms re-sorting themselves between state and federal oversight).
However, an AdvizorPro analysis revealed that the shutdown disrupted this pace, resulting in a total of 1,309 new RIA approvals. The total was lower than in 2012 and 2024, with a total of 1,369 RIA approvals.
Additionally, while registrations for all RIAs increased after the shutdown, the approval of new practicing RIAs rose more gradually.
Following a low of five new approvals during the shutdown in October, approvals increased to 21 and 18 in November and December, respectively. While increasing, these remained far below the monthly approval numbers during the rest of the year.