Data sourced from Dakota Marketplace, the global LP and GP intelligence platform trusted by thousands of investment professionals. Learn More | Book a Demo
Every quarter, institutional investment managers with $100 million or more in 13(f) securities report their holdings to the SEC (SEC Form 13F FAQ). The filings are public but not built for prospecting: each is one firm's list of issuer names, share counts and values, with no asset class tags and no quarter-over-quarter comparison. Finding which RIAs hold a given ETF means pulling filings firm by firm and doing the matching yourself.
Dakota Marketplace does that work for you. Its 13F tab holds 2,621,000+ holdings, including 938,000+ ETF positions, searchable by ticker, asset class and product structure, with Status fields that flag each position as New, Increased, Decreased or Sold-Out versus last quarter.
We used that data to find which fixed income ETFs the most RIAs actually own. Core bonds still lead: iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond (AGG) is held by 114 RIAs for the quarter ending December 31, 2025, followed by Vanguard Total Bond Market (BND) at 86. The bigger story sits at the short end of the curve, where more RIAs hold a T-bill or ultrashort ETF than hold AGG or BND. With fixed income ETFs taking in more than $384 billion through early December 2025, and active strategies capturing a record 38% of those flows (iShares, December 2025), that shift matters to every bond manager pitching RIAs.
In this article, we'll rank the 10 fixed income ETFs held by the most RIAs, show where the dollars concentrate, and break down what a short-duration, core-heavy bond book means for managers selling fixed income strategies.
The Top 10 Fixed Income ETFs Held by RIAs
Ranked by the number of distinct RIAs reporting a position in 13F filings for the quarter ending December 31, 2025.
|
Rank
|
Ticker
|
ETF
|
Category
|
RIA holdings
|
|
1
|
AGG
|
iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF
|
US core bond
|
114
|
|
2
|
BND
|
Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF
|
US core bond
|
86
|
|
3
|
VTEB
|
Vanguard Tax-Exempt Bond ETF
|
Municipal bond
|
75
|
|
4
|
JPST
|
JPMorgan Ultra-Short Income ETF
|
Ultrashort bond (active)
|
74
|
|
5
|
BSV
|
Vanguard Short-Term Bond ETF
|
Short-term bond
|
71
|
|
6
|
BIL
|
SPDR Bloomberg 1-3 Month T-Bill ETF
|
Treasury bills
|
64
|
|
7
|
SGOV
|
iShares 0-3 Month Treasury Bond ETF
|
Treasury bills
|
62
|
|
8
|
VCSH
|
Vanguard Short-Term Corporate Bond ETF
|
Short-term corporate
|
60
|
|
9
|
BNDX
|
Vanguard Total International Bond ETF
|
International bond
|
59
|
|
10
|
VCIT
|
Vanguard Intermediate-Term Corporate Bond ETF
|
Intermediate corporate
|
57
|
Source: Dakota Marketplace 13F holdings data, quarter ending December 31, 2025.
What the Ranking Shows
1. Core Aggregate Bonds Still Anchor the Book (AGG and BND, 145 RIAs)
The top two slots both track the broad US investment grade bond market. Of the 292 RIAs holding a bond ETF in Dakota's data, 145 hold AGG, BND or both, and 55 hold both. As in equities, ticker choice looks driven by custodian, model and client account history rather than a view on the index.
Bond ETFs are far less concentrated than equity ETFs. The most widely held bond fund, AGG, reaches 114 RIAs, about half the 231 RIAs that hold SPY. RIAs spread their fixed income across many more funds and sub-asset classes than they do their equity core.
2. Cash Has Moved Into ETFs (191 RIAs Hold a T-Bill or Ultrashort ETF)
Three of the top seven funds sit at the very short end of the curve: JPMorgan Ultra-Short Income (JPST, 74 RIAs), SPDR 1-3 Month T-Bill (BIL, 64) and iShares 0-3 Month Treasury (SGOV, 62). Across all T-bill and ultrashort ETFs, 191 RIAs hold at least one, more than the 145 that hold AGG or BND.
These funds act as the cash sleeve of the portfolio. RIAs use them to hold client cash at a market yield inside the same account as the rest of the book, rather than in a money market fund or a bank sweep.
3. Munis Make the Top Three (VTEB at 75 RIAs)
Vanguard Tax-Exempt Bond (VTEB) ranks third, ahead of every short-term, corporate and international fund. Across all municipal bond ETFs, 170 RIAs hold at least one, with $1.6B in holdings.
For RIAs serving high-net-worth clients in high tax brackets, the after-tax yield on munis often beats taxable bonds, which makes tax-exempt exposure a standard building block rather than a niche allocation.
Want to see which RIAs in your territory hold these funds? Book a demo of Dakota Marketplace.
Breadth vs. Dollars: Where RIA Assets Concentrate
The ETFs held by the most RIAs are not always the ones holding the most RIA money. RIAs reported $21.0B in fixed income ETF holdings for the quarter ending December 31, 2025, and the top 10 funds account for $4.7B of it.
|
Ticker
|
ETF
|
RIA holding
|
RIA holdings
|
|
AGG
|
iShares Core U.S. Aggregate Bond ETF
|
114
|
$973M
|
|
FBND
|
Fidelity Total Bond ETF
|
46
|
$665M
|
|
BND
|
Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF
|
86
|
$595M
|
|
IUSB
|
iShares Core Total USD Bond Market ETF
|
45
|
$592M
|
|
BSV
|
Vanguard Short-Term Bond ETF
|
71
|
$546M
|
|
DFSD
|
Dimensional Short-Duration Fixed Income ETF
|
31
|
$531M
|
AGG leads by both measures, but the money spreads out quickly behind it. Fidelity Total Bond (FBND), an actively managed core-plus fund, holds more RIA money than BND from roughly half as many firms.
Active bond ETFs show the same pattern across the list. Dimensional's DFSD (531M,31RIAs)andDFCF(520M, 30 RIAs), BlackRock Flexible Income (BINC, $479M, 43 RIAs), PIMCO Multisector Bond (PYLD, $389M, 42 RIAs) and JPMorgan Core Plus Bond (JCPB, $345M, 28 RIAs) all draw large tickets from a few dozen firms each. That fits the broader market: active strategies took a record 38% of fixed income ETF flows in 2025, compared with 34% in equities, according to iShares.
Source: Dakota Marketplace 13F holdings data, quarter ending December 31, 2025.
What This Means for Investment Firms Pitching RIAs
RIA bond books are spread across more funds than their equity books, with a passive core, a large cash sleeve and an active layer drawing large tickets. That leaves more room for a fixed income manager than an equity manager facing an S&P 500 core.
-
Pitch against the core, not instead of it. An RIA holding AGG or BND is unlikely to sell it. Show how your strategy fits beside a passive aggregate position: core-plus, multisector, securitized or credit exposure the index underweights.
-
Target the cash sleeve. 191 RIAs hold T-bill or ultrashort ETFs. For managers of short-duration, ultrashort or enhanced cash strategies, these firms have already decided to put cash to work in an ETF wrapper.
-
Use muni holdings to find high-net-worth books. An RIA holding VTEB or other muni ETFs is serving clients in high tax brackets. That is a natural opening for tax-aware fixed income and separately managed muni strategies.
-
Find the active bond buyers. The firms writing large tickets to FBND, BINC, PYLD and the Dimensional funds have shown they will pay for active fixed income. They are the first call for active bond managers.
Turn 13F Holdings Into a Prospect List
Every number in this post came from the 13F tab in Dakota Marketplace. Members filter 2,621,000+ holdings by account name, investment strategy, ticker, asset class, sub-asset class, product structure, fund balance range and filing period, and switch between a By Investor and a By Fund view.
Seven new fields make the data faster to act on:
- Quarter-over-quarter change on any holding: Previous No. of Shares, Previous Quarter Value and Status (New, Increased, Decreased, Equal Shares or Sold-Out) show who is adding or trimming a position, with no filing to open and no math to do.
- ETF exposure on every account: ETF AUM, ETF AUM %, Active ETF AUM and Passive ETF AUM answer "does this RIA use ETFs, and how much?" right on the account page.
That gives investment firms three ways to build a sharper list:
-
Find who holds a competitor's fund. Search a ticker and pull every firm reporting it.
-
Spot momentum. Filter by Status to see which RIAs bought or added to a position last quarter, and which sold out.
-
Target real holdings, not stated mandates. An RIA that leans active in its ETF book is a very different conversation than one that runs almost entirely passive.
Members can now build and save their own 13F lists with Create a List and My Lists, then export any list to Excel to share or print.
Find the RIAs Behind the Holdings
Dakota Marketplace tracks 8,700+ RIAs and 48,300+ RIA contacts, with 13F holdings attached to each firm profile. Filter by ETF ticker or asset class held, by RIA AUM, by metro area, or by decision-maker title such as CIO or portfolio manager.
Book a demo of Dakota Marketplace to know what an RIA already owns before you pitch what it should add.
