Charles Schwab Reports Record Q3 2026 Revenue of $7.17 Billion as Core Net New Assets Hit $190.4 Billion

Charles Schwab posted record third-quarter 2026 results on October 15, with net revenue of $7.17 billion, adjusted earnings per share of $1.69, and a record $190.4 billion in core net new assets, according to the company's earnings release carried by StockTitan and a separate summary from Seeking Alpha Market News. Revenue rose 16.8% year over year but landed about $10 million below Wall Street's consensus estimate, even as adjusted earnings beat expectations by three cents, per Seeking Alpha's figures.

Earnings Beat Estimates, Top Line Narrowly Misses

Schwab's reported net income totaled $2.9 billion, or $1.62 per share, on a GAAP basis. Excluding $151 million of pre-tax transaction-related costs, adjusted net income was $3.0 billion and adjusted EPS was $1.69, according to the company's release via StockTitan. Seeking Alpha's tracking data shows the $1.69 adjusted figure topped consensus by $0.03, while the $7.17 billion revenue total came in roughly $10 million short of estimates. Neither source reviewed breaks out which revenue line — trading, asset management fees or net interest revenue — accounted for the shortfall versus consensus, so the source of the gap cannot be confirmed from the available reporting.

Record Net New Assets and Account Growth

The headline growth figure was core net new assets of $190.4 billion for the quarter, up 38% from the third quarter of 2025. Schwab characterized this as a 5.8% annualized growth rate and said clients opened 1.2 million new brokerage accounts during the period, per the company's release. Total client assets rose 15% year over year to $13.33 trillion, according to Seeking Alpha's summary of the results. Neither source reviewed here breaks the $190.4 billion down by channel or identifies any single large institutional inflow, so the figure should be read as an aggregate quarterly total rather than a segmented one.

Lending, Sweep Cash and Balance Sheet Activity

Client transactional sweep cash balances ended September at $492.8 billion, up $7.1 billion from the prior quarter-end. Schwab attributed the increase to continued demand for long/short strategies and organic growth, partially offset by client asset allocation decisions, according to the company's release. That characterization, drawn directly from Schwab's own language in the release, suggests cash movement was not uniformly directional but shaped by competing client behaviors.

Lending and advice balances expanded notably. Margin loan balances rose 14% quarter over quarter to $187.9 billion, including $60.7 billion tied to long/short strategies. Bank loan balances reached $72.3 billion, up 35% year over year, and Pledged Asset Line balances climbed to $37.3 billion, up 59% year over year. Net flows into Schwab Wealth Advisory increased 55%, per the company's release. Taken together, these figures point to broadening client engagement across lending and advisory products alongside the asset-gathering story, though the release itself does not quantify net interest margin or detail the pace of any ongoing cash-sorting dynamic beyond the sweep-cash figures cited above.

Capital Position

Schwab reported preliminary consolidated Tier 1 Leverage of 8.9% and adjusted Tier 1 Leverage of 7.0%, which the company described as capital ratios that "remained strong" across the firm, according to the earnings release.

Management Commentary and What Wasn't Addressed

CFO Mike Verdeschi said in the release that "deeper client engagement across Schwab's platform continues to broaden and strengthen our revenue model, helping our third quarter revenue increase 17% year-over-year to a record $7.2 billion," a figure consistent with the $7.17 billion reported total when rounded. The release names President and CEO Rick Wurster and CFO Verdeschi as the quoted executives.

Forward-looking topics such as expectations for 2027 expense growth, share buyback plans, or the pace of paying down supplemental or high-cost funding were not addressed in the earnings release itself. The company separately hosted a Fall Business Update for institutional investors the same morning, from 7:30 to 8:30 a.m., but the content of that session is not covered in the earnings materials reviewed for this report. As a result, no claims about 2027 guidance, buyback sizing, or deposit-cost trajectory can be sourced to Schwab's earnings release, and readers should not infer such guidance was given in that document.

Bottom Line

Schwab delivered record revenue, record net new assets and an adjusted EPS beat in the third quarter of 2026, even as the top line came in about $10 million below consensus, per Seeking Alpha's tracking data. Read together, and as interpretation rather than reported fact, the quarter pairs strong asset gathering and sharply higher lending balances with a revenue result that essentially matched rather than exceeded analyst models: a $10 million gap on $7.17 billion is a fraction of a percent, and neither source reviewed identifies it as a weak spot. Investors looking for the segment composition of net new assets, or forward guidance on expenses and capital return, will need to look beyond the earnings release, since that detail was not part of the materials reviewed here.