Deals Are the First Casualties of the Trade War
JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo all struggled to clear up the huge uncertainty created by Trump’s tariffs.
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said sorting out the tariff war was paramount.
Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg
Pause or delete? That is the question for investment bank clients looking at doing deals or taking companies public. Morgan Stanley’s Chief Executive Officer Ted Pick still thinks that the backed-up pipeline of activity Wall Street has had for months should still get done eventually. But in truth, the message from three big US banks that reported first-quarter results on Friday was: Nobody has a clue what the effects of President Trump’s trade war are going to be, only that the longer the uncertainty goes on, the worse it will get.
Big swings in markets in the first three months of the year were great for stock trading desks, less good for bond and currency desks and frankly miserable for dealmakers. JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley both beat estimates for equities trading by about 20% but missed estimates for advisory fees on mergers and acquisitions and stock market listings.