Vanguard’s Rapid Growth Is Not Without Challenges. Here’s How the Fund Giant Is Responding

Ivanna Hampton: Vanguard is evolving as it grows bigger while keeping its investor-first reputation intact. Investing Insights recently examined the 2026 outlook for the large asset manager in a two-part series. I spoke with Dan Sotiroff on April 8, 2026. Here’s what the Vanguard analyst and Associate Director of US Passive Strategies Research for Morningstar had to say about the firm. Vanguard has grown significantly over the last decade, more than doubling its clients between 2015 and 2025. What have been the ups and downs of this expansion, and how is the firm handling them?

Daniel Sotiroff: First off, I think it’s awesome that investors have figured out what Vanguard is and what it can deliver for them. They figured out that cost matters, that well-managed investments matter, and index funds, I think, are a big part of that. That’s been a big part of Vanguard’s growth over the last 50 years, let alone the last 10. People have figured it out, which is great. I mean, for someone in my position, that’s what we want to see. But yeah, the growth, it puts a lot more pressure on Vanguard systems and the people that they have to manage all those clients’ needs. From my conversations with their leaders, they’ve been pretty candid that growth has been the biggest problem. I think you see it crop up here and there when you have client complaints and things like that, that kind of surface.

It’s not that they’re trying to do that; it’s that they’re trying to cope with this massive amount of growth that they’re experiencing, not just in money, but in terms of sheer number of clients that they’re handling now. It’s tough, and they have to do that while still being the low-cost provider at the end of the day and keeping fees low. It’s a challenge, but they’ve been able to manage it so far pretty well. I think a lot of the client issues have been fixed. It’s not going to be perfect, but they’re making investments in that area and other areas of their advice model and stuff like that to try and improve that. It’s not perfect, like I said, but they’re trying to do what they can given the problems they face. It’s very much like a good problem to have. There are a lot of other asset managers out there that wish they had this problem. They’re doing good regardless of that.

Hampton: Vanguard’s CEO, Salim Ramji, came from BlackRock, and he’s bringing high-profile talent from his former firm. Who are these folks and what roles are they stepping into at Vanguard?

Sotiroff: We should probably say we don’t know if Salim had anything to do with this. There might be a connection there that we don’t know. Some of them are coming from divisions at BlackRock where he previously worked. There might be a connection there, but we don’t really know. I think the bigger thing is, like you see this in the industry and not just within asset management, but you see this in any business. People move from one company to another for various reasons. So, the few people that have surfaced so far, Eve Cout came from BlackRock’s wealth advisory division. It sounds like she’s taking on the role of head of advisor solutions. I’ve got to check my notes here, and that’s going to be in the division that serves Vanguard’s financial advisors. Rachel Aguirre also joined from the same division at BlackRock. She has more of a product development background.

I’m familiar with her because she was a portfolio manager on a lot of their index-tracking ETFs at one point. And then she moved more into a product development role at BlackRock. That would be more of a role where you’re actually determining what ETFs you want to put out in the market and figuring out how those are going to work. But yeah, similar type of work there. The third name that surfaced was Del Stafford, another product development guy, but he’s going into Vanguard’s new wealth and advice division that they spun out or they formed last year, I should say, maybe a better word. He’s actually kind of a Vanguard boomerang. I think he started his career at Vanguard, went to BlackRock, and now he’s coming back to Vanguard again. When you look at that type of stuff, this isn’t what it seems. These are all kinds of senior leaders. The other thing you have to keep in mind is that when you’re a firm that’s as big as Vanguard, and you want to get the best of the best into those leadership positions, you don’t have a lot of places you can go to look for talent.

It’s probably going to be at BlackRock or State Street or another large asset manager, and there are relatively few of those people. It might just be a coincidence that they’re all coming from BlackRock, too.

Hampton: Are these areas that Ramji is seeking to expand?

Sotiroff: Yeah. The financial advisor division that Eve and Rachel are going to, that’s actually their biggest division in terms of clients and money. Vanguard is associated with retail investors a lot, like the little guys. That’s actually their second biggest segment that they serve. Both are big. Don’t get me wrong. They’re both big, and they’re both important, but advisors are actually just a little bit bigger. And then the advice area, we know that’s no secret at this point, that’s something that they’re really trying to take a serious go at, but just evidenced by the fact that Ramji spun out that wealth and advice unit last year to create a separate division that’s focused on that, really shows their intentionality at going after that segment. Yeah, they’re both important.