11.03.2013 - Commodities squeeze banks
Wall Street's commodity-trading gold mine is all but tapped out. Once a booming source of bank profit, the business has been hit hard by tougher new rules and subdued markets. Revenue from trading the likes of oil, metals and soybeans dropped 16% last year at J.P. Morgan Chase and 20% at Morgan Stanley, according to securities filings. At Goldman Sachs Group Inc., long considered the firm to beat in commodities, commodity revenue slumped to $575 million from $1.6 billion in 2011 and $4.6 billion in the bumper year of 2009. A survey by research firm Coalition of the largest global investment banks shows commodity revenue fell 24% from a year earlier in 2012, to around $6 billion, tumbling by more than 50% since 2008...............................................Full Article: Source
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