Goldman suffers most as analysts slash earnings expectations

Goldman suffers most as analysts slash earnings expectations

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. has been the hardest hit among the six biggest banks.

Pedestrians pass in front of the Goldman Sachs Group Inc. headquarters in New York. (Bloomberg pic)
NEW YORK:
Wall Street analysts have become increasingly pessimistic about bank earnings. Along with a slew of ratings and price target cuts, they’ve trimmed estimates for earnings per share this fourth quarter by the most for any year-end quarter since 2016, and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. has been the hardest hit among the six biggest banks, according to Bloomberg data.

Analysts have cut estimates for Goldman, Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., Morgan Stanley, and Wells Fargo & Co. by an average of 8.1% since the last quarter’s earnings reports. Yet they’ve cropped Goldman estimates by 27%.

Bank estimates have been trimmed amid pessimism about weak trading results. Citigroup warned last month that its fourth-quarter fixed-income trading revenue may fall and it was likely to miss targeted efficiency ratio for the year. JPMorgan said its trading results may be unchanged from last year’s results. Goldman however, has a new CEO tasked with handling additional scrutiny over the 1MDB corruption probe; the investment community has been awaiting details on how to quantify the impact and legal reserves needed by the bank.

Citigroup will kick off earnings for banks on Monday, followed by ; JPMorgan and Wells Fargo report on Tuesday, BofA and Goldman on Wednesday, and Morgan Stanley is due on Thursday. The KBW bank index has added 5.6% so far this year after falling 20% in 2018.

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