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Stock Traders Prove Winners as Wall Street Awaits Morgan Stanley

Stock Traders Prove Winners as Wall Street Awaits Morgan Stanley

(Bloomberg) -- With five banks down and one to go, all eyes are on stock trading.

Bouts of volatility in the first few months of the year propelled gains for equities-trading desks across Wall Street, with Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. all reporting increases in that business. Analysts are expecting that trend to continue with Morgan Stanley, which is scheduled to report first-quarter results Wednesday.

Stock Traders Prove Winners as Wall Street Awaits Morgan Stanley

The only winner on the fixed-income trading side so far? Goldman Sachs. The New York-based bank overcame a rough 2017 to post a 23 percent revenue increase in that business. Bank of America and Citigroup faced declining revenue, while JPMorgan was flat excluding some one-time gains. Seven analysts surveyed by Bloomberg are expecting Morgan Stanley to report a 4.8 percent decline in credit trading.

Stock Traders Prove Winners as Wall Street Awaits Morgan Stanley

The first three months of 2018 were rough for equity markets. The S&P 500 Index posted its first quarterly decline after nine straight periods of gains. Still, banks’ wealth- and asset-management units weren’t too fazed. Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan all reported increases in revenue figures for those businesses, while Wells Fargo’s dropped just 0.4 percent.

Stock Traders Prove Winners as Wall Street Awaits Morgan Stanley

To contact the reporters on this story: Katherine Chiglinsky in New York at kchiglinsky@bloomberg.net, Jenny Surane in New York at jsurane4@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Michael J. Moore at mmoore55@bloomberg.net, Steven Crabill, Dan Reichl

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