Wells Fargo looks good. It had strong loan growth, credit quality remains stable, and the mortgage business looks robust despite higher interest rates.
I give them high marks for positioning themselves for a challenging rate environment, and reducing their securities portfolio well in advance of other banks.
Results so far are consistent with strength in capital markets. There is significant strength overseas, and volatility in interest rates and commodities is presenting attractive opportunities for trading.
There are areas of weakness. It seems growth is difficult for banks, which I would attribute to a flat yield curve and higher funding costs.
The question for Chuck Prince is, Can he grow the bank?
We currently have over 500,000 unique monthly users across our sites and the number just keeps growing.
Commercial and industrial loans are growing at a double- digit pace and that's indicative of a fairly strong economy. That, coupled with stable credit quality, has been a positive for banks that focus on small and middle-market businesses.
The wind is at their back in many of their businesses. We're seeing out of the investment banks good capital markets business.
People are worried about possible net interest margin compression and credit quality deterioration, as well as slowing consumer loan growth.
Despite rising rates and competitive products elsewhere, such as money market funds, Wells Fargo posted strong deposit growth.
About 90 percent of our revenue comes from online advertising,
The numbers looked good. American Express is benefiting from the longer-term trend of consumers and small businesses switching from cash and checks to credit cards.
The bankruptcy issue is a one-time situation. Commercial and industrial loan growth was fairly strong and should be the key driver of earnings growth this year for the regional banks.
The yield-curve flattening has certainly been challenging for banks. The winners and losers will be decided on how well they can generate revenues faster than expenses are growing.
The institutional business is very competitive. If you don't have meaningful scale, it's hard to compete.
In some markets we're seeing reasonably strong deposit growth and pretty much across the board, commercial and industrial, middle-market business loans are fairly robust. It's a sign the economy remains fairly strong.
Clearly, Wells Fargo is one of the better-positioned banks. It is in growth markets, has strong asset quality and profitability metrics and its valuation appears reasonable.