Wall Street Firms Have Best Quarter Since Crisis (JPM, GS, MS, BAC)

The Wall Street Journal reported that Wall Street firms are about to close their most lucrative quarter since the credit crisis erupted.

Companies such as J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM), Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS), Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) and Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) are doing well with their historic bread and butter, which is trading and underwriting.

Investor enthusiasm in the debt markets fueled issuance of $1.5 trillion globally from the start of the Q2 through Monday, according to Dealogic. That was just slightly lower than Q1, but the latest results showed a rebound in high-yield issuance.

Equity offerings reached nearly $260 billion during Q2 which is almost 4 times the amount recorded during Q1, and the highest since 2008's second quarter, Dealogic said.

In trading, the range between bid and offer prices on fixed-income assets remained wide during the quarter, boosting profits from buying and selling these securities. Fixed-income trading is one of the main earnings boosters for securities firms.

A majority of the quarter's equity issuance came after banks rushed to raise nearly $90 billion following the government's stress tests. There also was a backlog of issuers taking advantage of the market's strength since early March, not necessarily a major shift in market sentiment.

Wall Street is heading historically into the sluggish summer months so things should slow for the next couple month.

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