It’s a good time to be a megabank.
In many businesses, the largest global banks such as JPMorgan Chase & Co. JPM, +0.11% and Bank of America Corp. BAC, +0.26% are getting bigger, while others are struggling to keep pace. The latest example: the volatility-induced surge in first-quarter stock-trading revenue that smaller U.S. investment banks almost universally missed out on.
Stifel Financial Corp. SF, +0.41% , Raymond James Financial Inc., RJF, +0.03% Evercore Inc. EVR, -0.44% and Piper Jaffray Cos. PJC, -0.14% all reported drops of 10% or more in stock-trading revenue for the first three months of 2018 compared with a year ago, according to company filings, resulting in the lowest market share in years for midtier trading firms.
By contrast, trading arms of the biggest U.S. banks—at JPMorgan and Bank of America, as well as at Citigroup Inc., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. GS, +0.90% and Morgan Stanley MS, +1.04% —posted gains in equities sales and trading revenue ranging from 26% to 38% for the quarter versus a year ago.
An expanded version of this report appears at WSJ.com
Popular on WSJ.com