Fueled by AI and macroeconomic uncertainty, the appetite for U.S. corporate access, the business of connecting investors to corporate executives by the sell-side, rose at an unabated pace that surprised even the region’s top providers this year.

Demand for in-person corporate access, whether through conferences, non-deal roadshows, or field trips, has remained exceptionally strong and continues to increase, confirmed Olivia Lee, head of corporate access at Jefferies.

“The biggest surprise in 2026 has been the pace of change,” she said. “Between the rapid advancement of AI and ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty, investors have sought more direct engagement with management teams to separate signal from noise and better understand business fundamentals, supply chains, and trade dynamics.

At times, it felt as though investors were gripping the floor during an earthquake, making in-person interactions more valuable than ever.”

2026 was another year in which demand for U.S. corporate access continued to outpace supply, and that demand became both more intense and more complex, summed up Jen Fink, head of Americas corporate access for BofA Securities.

“As our largest clients have grown, so too have the breadth and sophistication of their needs,” she said. “At the same time, C-suite executives remain highly constrained in the amount of time they can dedicate to the Street, making high-quality access increasingly valuable.”

It has been a year of continued evolution in what clients want from corporate access, Daniel Gaviria, global head of corporate access at Morgan Stanley, said.

“While traditional management access and our flagship conferences remain incredibly important, clients increasingly want access that helps them connect major investment themes across traditional sector boundaries,” he said. “Alongside our sector-led corporate access franchise, we have built a much more deliberate thematic corporate access offering around private and non-covered companies, industry experts and cross-sector ideas.”

“The objective is not simply to create more events, but to connect our thematic research and actionable investment ideas with differentiated access and broaden the investor audience consuming that content,” he added.

That connection has been recognized by respondents to Extel’s 2026 Corporate Access ranking, where buy-side voters were asked to rank up to five firms in each of the seven categories.

Morgan Stanley was awarded the No. 1 spot in this year’s survey based on the responses from 1,047 buy-side individuals at 564 firms. The firm took the crown after finishing in second place last year.

Much like the unfettered pace of change in corporate access, there were significant moves in this year’s leaderboard results. Jefferies moved up the rankings one spot to take second place in this year’s survey followed by BofA Securities, which jumped from fifth place to take third. J.P. Morgan and UBS were fourth and fifth, respectively. Gaviria credited Morgan Stanley’s “integrated firm” as a noteworthy advantage. “I have a team with connectivity across virtually every corner of Morgan Stanley, but connectivity alone isn’t enough,” he said. “It works because we have a management team that understands and supports the importance of corporate access, both as part of our investors’ investment process and in helping our corporate clients connect with pools of capital around the globe. That combination of management support, an experienced corporate access team and the breadth of the firm allows us to bring the best of Morgan Stanley to both investors and corporates.”

At Jefferies, Lee said closely listening to the needs of its investors and corporates, and shaping their offering around what they value most, is a key differentiator.

“We provide a range of access formats, from our highly regarded flagship sector conferences, where investors can meet the companies that matter most and engage with peers to cut through market noise, such as the London Healthcare Conference, to more intimate settings that facilitate deeper, higher-quality engagement,” she said. “Events such as our Consumer Conference in Nantucket and Energy Conference on Kiawah Island create opportunities for meaningful interaction with management teams beyond the traditional meeting-room format.”

It is also important to be agile in developing timely, thematic access opportunities, which Jefferies has done this year, she added. Recent examples include a private AI Summit, which brought together 35 leading industry executives, and an upcoming Datacenter Summit, both designed to facilitate dialogue around some of the most important structural trends shaping markets today. In addition, the firm has hosted more than 50 field trips year-to-date.

“As investors increasingly value firsthand insight, visits to corporate headquarters, exposure to assets, and opportunities to engage with the next layer of management have become an important part of the corporate access experience and investment process,” Lee added.

To highlight the continued importance of in-person events like these, for the third year Extel has included a conferences ranking. Both buy-side and corporate voters named their top 5 conferences over the past year to produce a top 10 list for each table.

In addition to winning the survey, Morgan Stanley topped the buy-side list of conferences with its San Francisco-based Technology, Media & Telecom Conference followed by UBS in second with its Global Technology and AI conference in Scottsdale, Arizona. J.P. Morgan’s Healthcare Conference in San Francisco took third.