While wirehouses blame volatile markets for their wealth units’ poor performance, Raymond James’ revenue and profits both rose last quarter, the Wall Street Journal writes.
The brokerage earned $125.8 million in the quarter ending March 31, compared to $113.5 million a year earlier, the Journal reports. Revenue was also up 2% from a year earlier, reaching $1.34 billion, according to the publication.
The company attributed the growth in revenue to the rise in short-term interest rates last year, which helped its loan portfolios and grew revenue in client cash balances, the Journal writes.
Interest revenue jumped 20% from last year while fee-based revenue rose 3%, but revenue from commissions fell 1%, according to the publication.
All of Raymond James’ units, including its private-client group, capital markets and asset management groups, had gains in revenue, but the banking group, which serves brokerage clients, had a 22% jump in revenue from last year, the Journal writes.
Client assets, meanwhile, grew by 4% to $513.7 billion, and the company added net 78 advisors, bringing the total to 6,765.
Raymond James’ positive news came out days after Wells Fargo and Morgan Stanley reported lower profits in their wealth management units for the first quarter, while Bank of America’s wealth unit reported a drop in revenue, as reported previously. The weak results came in despite the higher revenue in banking and lending at all three firms in the first quarter, as reported by the Journal.
Raymond James CEO Paul Reilly said in a statement that he expects growth to continue, boosted by a “strong recruiting pipeline” as well as by the expected addition of over 90% of advisors from the Alex. Brown division the company is acquiring from Deutsche Bank Wealth Management, according to ThinkAdvisor.
To read the Think Advisor article cited in this story, click here.