Morgan Stanley said fourth-quarter profit rose 51 percent from a year earlier, another big US bank coming out of a turbulent year in better shape than expected at the start of the coronavirus pandemic .
The New York-based company reported a profit of $ 3.39 billion, or $ 1.81 per share. Revenues rose 26% to $ 13.64 billion. Both exceeded the consensus estimates of analysts surveyed by FactSet, who predicted earnings per share of $ 1.30 for revenue of $ 11.58 billion.
Morgan Stanley completed fourth-quarter earnings reports from the nation’s major banks, which continued to benefit from a recovery on Wall Street and federal pandemic response measures that prevented the worst economic scenario. On Tuesday, rival Goldman Sachs Group Inc. reported a profit in the fourth quarter, which was more than twice as high as the previous year’s results and annual revenues that were at an 11-year high.
Focusing on wealthy Americans and large corporations and money managers, Morgan Stanley is less exposed to mass unemployment and small business closures than more Main Street banks.
Morgan Stanley’s stock and bond trading revenues rose 32% to $ 4.22 billion, a jump higher than any other bank. Investment banking fees increased 46% to $ 2.30 billion, mainly due to $ 1 billion in revenue generated by Morgan Stanley for underwriting initial public offerings and other share offerings. These taxes have doubled more than in the fourth quarter of 2019.