Fidelity Investments will require thousands of its U.S. employees to come into the office five days a week, ending a more generous policy that allowed them to work remotely half the month.
The new mandate, which takes effect in September, coincides with the asset manager's expansion into new offices in the Boston Seaport District from its longtime headquarters downtown.
The new policy applies to all of Fidelity's roughly 6,200 Boston-based workers, as well as more than 15,000 staffers spread across New Hampshire, Kentucky and New Mexico, with the exception of those in phone-based customer service roles. Globally, the company has about 80,000 employees.
"Fidelity's belief is that being physically together creates more opportunities for a meaningful associate experience filled with connection, mentorship, and learning," a Fidelity spokesperson said in a statement.
Fidelity has been an outlier in the financial-services industry, where many employers have already sharply reduced or ditched pandemic-era accommodations for remote work.
Since September 2024, Fidelity has required employees to come into the office for a full week twice every four weeks, enabling them to stay home much more often than their peers at Boston firms including State Street Corp. and Wellington Management. Those two companies require employees to be in the office four days a week.
A real estate affiliate of Fidelity has spent more than five years and considerable money redeveloping a property on a Boston Harbor pier. The development will feature about 650,000 square feet of office space as well as retail stores and a new public plaza, with the first Fidelity employees expected to move in late this summer.
In advance of the move, Fidelity had tried to rent out its current downtown headquarters to other tenants but is now switching gears. The asset manager will instead keep both that 800,000-square-foot office next to South Station and its nearly finished Seaport home, to ensure it has enough room for all of its Boston employees once they're coming in every day.
That decision is a boon for downtown Boston. Nearly a quarter of the neighborhood's office space is available for rent and foot traffic has yet to return to pre-pandemic levels. Fidelity has grown its local headcount by 24% since 2016, according to city data.
The new policy doesn't apply to Fidelity employees in certain states such as North Carolina and Rhode Island. The firm is looking to add space in those markets so it has enough capacity to support a full return to office. However, all executives at the vice president level and above will be required to be in the office five days a week starting in September, regardless of location. Senior employees in India and Ireland are also affected.
Credit: Shutterstock
Copyright 2026 Bloomberg. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
© Arc, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to TMSalesOperations@arc-network.com. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.