The Future is Here Zero commissions for trading stocks and ETFs is now reality. It started with Charles Schwab’s blockbuster announcement in the fall of 2019 that it would no longer charge trading commissions. All competitors had little choice but to follow suit. The impacts of free trading are widespread, especially for independent RIAs. Most advisors custody with one of the large RIA focused broker-custodians, such as Schwab, TD Ameritrade, Fidelity, or Pershing Advisor Solutions. Advisors and their clients stand to benefit directly from no-cost trading. Another potentially huge outcome is the expected rise of direct indexing—the ability to replicate an index by directly owning the underlying securities instead of an ETF or mutual fund. In the past, trading costs compe

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