The Willis Towers Watson Global 500 report compiled a list of the 500 largest fund managers in the world as of 31 December 2016, and Macquarie has retained its position as Australia's largest fund manager.
Macquarie remained in the top 100 global fund managers at $472 billion, while Colonial First State slipped to 102 with $192 billion.
AMP was the third-largest Australian fund manager with $155 billion ranked at 120 globally, followed by BT Investment management (182nd) and QIC (193rd).
Globally, BlackRock was the largest money manager with US$5.15 trillion in funds under management, followed by Vanguard (US$3.97 trillion) and State Street (US$2.47 trillion).
Commenting on the results of the study, Willis Towers Watson director of manager research Dania Zinurova said it was encouraging to see a return to growth in total global assets, which increased 5.8 per cent throughout 2016 to $81.2 trillion for the world's 500 largest fund managers.
"Whilst passive assets remain significantly smaller than actively managed assets, the proportion of passively managed assets has grown from 16.5 per cent to 21.6 per cent over the last five years alone," Ms Zinurova said.
"We expect that this trend will continue to put downward pressure on traditional fee structures, particularly among active managers seeking to remain competitive and to maximise value to investors."
