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JPMorgan Chase & Co. has established a new unit within its commercial and investment bank focused on creating bespoke financing structures that span public and private markets. Named Strategic Financing Solutions, the unit will integrate efforts across banking, markets, and sales, according to an internal memo circulated Monday. Initially, the unit will concentrate on structured private solutions, infrastructure finance, strategic asset-backed securities finance, merchant banking, and direct lending. “Financing needs are becoming increasingly complex while investors are seeking exposure to new markets,” wrote Doug Petno and Troy Rohrbaugh, co-heads of the commercial and investment bank. The memo stated that the new team “will focus on delivering alternative solutions to our corporate and sponsor clients.” Warfield Price, head of general industries leveraged finance, and Masi Yamada, global head of corporate structuring, will co-lead the group while retaining their current roles. They will report to Kevin Foley, global head of capital markets, and Brad Tully, global head of private side sales and corporate derivatives. The initiative targets the convergence of public and private markets, noting that many U.S. firms are choosing to remain private longer and are demanding more complex financial solutions. A notable example is JPMorgan’s advisory role in 3G Capital’s $9.4 billion acquisition of Skechers USA Inc., a deal involving cash, debt, two term loans, two notes, and a revolving credit facility. The new unit will also encompass JPMorgan’s direct lending operations, for which the bank allocated an additional $50 billion this year after deploying over $10 billion across 100 deals since 2021. In a February interview, Foley emphasized the bank’s “product-agnostic” approach to serving clients. The move mirrors Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s recent formation of a capital solutions group, which also reflects the rising significance of private markets.

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JPMorgan reported revenue was $44.9 billion and managed revenue was $45.7 billion. Expenses totaled $23.8 billion, resulting in a reported overhead ratio of 53% and a managed overhead ratio of 52%. Credit costs were $2.8 billion, including $2.4 billion of net charge-offs and a $439 million net reserve build. Average loans increased 5% year-over-year and 3% quarter-over-quarter, while average deposits rose 6% year-over-year and 3% quarter-over-quarter. In the Consumer & Community Banking (CCB) segment, return on equity (ROE) was 36%. Average deposits declined 1% year-over-year but rose 1% quarter-over-quarter; client investment assets grew 14% year-over-year. Average loans were up 1% year-over-year and flat quarter-over-quarter, with Card Services posting a net charge-off rate of 3.40%. Debit and credit card sales volume increased 7% year-over-year, and active mobile customers grew 8% year-over-year.

Consumer & Community Banking

Net income of $5.2B, up 23% YoY

Revenue of $18.8B, up 6% YoY, predominantly driven by higher net

interest income in Card Services on higher revolving balances, higher

noninterest revenue in Banking & Wealth Management, as well as higher

operating lease income in Auto

Expense of $9.9B, up 5% YoY, largely driven by higher technology

expense and higher auto lease depreciation

Credit costs of $2.1B

NCOs of $2.1B, up $22mm YoY, primarily driven by Card Services

Reserves were relatively flat, as changes in the weighted-average

macroeconomic outlook were offset by loan growth in Card Service

Commercial & Investment Bank

IB revenue of $2.7B, up 9% YoY, predominantly driven by higher debt underwriting and advisory fees, partially offset by lower equity underwriting fees  

Payments revenue of $4.7B, up 4% YoY; excluding the net impact of equity investments, revenue up 3%, driven by higher deposit balances and fee growth, predominantly offset by deposit margin compression Lending revenue of $1.8B, down 6% YoY, largely driven by higher losses on hedges of the retained lending portfolio

Asset & Wealth Management

Revenue of $5.8B, up 10% YoY, driven by growth in management fees on strong net inflows and higher average market levels, as well as higher brokerage activity and higher deposit balances  Expense of $3.7B, up 5% YoY, driven by higher compensation, includinghigher revenue-related compensation and continued growth in private banking advisor teams, as well as higher distribution fees AUM of $4.3T was up 18% YoY and client assets of $6.4T were up 19% YoY, each driven by continued net inflows and higher market levels For the quarter, AUM had long-term net inflows of $31B and liquidity net inflows of $5B Average loans of $241B, up 7% YoY and 3% QoQ Average deposits of $248B, up 9% YoY and 2% QoQ

Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO, commented on the financial results: “We reported another quarter of strong results, generating net income of $15.0 billion or net income of $14.2 billion excluding a significant item.” Dimon continued: “Each of the lines of business performed well. In the CIB, Markets revenue rose to $8.9 billion, and we supported clients as they navigated volatile market conditions at the beginning of the quarter. Meanwhile, IB activity started slow but gained momentum as market sentiment improved, and IB fees were up 7% for the quarter. In CCB, we added approximately 500,000 net new checking accounts, which drove sequential growth in checking account balances. In Card, we launched a refreshed Sapphire Reserve along with a new Sapphire Reserve for Business, with positive early reactions and strong new card acquisitions. Finally, in AWM, asset management fees rose 10%, and we saw continued client asset net inflows of $80 billion, with client assets crossing over $6.4 trillion.”

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Citigroup 2Q25 reported net income for the second quarter 2025 of $4.0 billion, or $1.96 per diluted share, on revenues of $21.7 billion. This compares to net income of $3.2 billion, or $1.52 per diluted share, on revenues of $20.0 billion for the second quarter 2024. Revenues increased 8% from the prior-year period on a reported basis, driven by growth in each of Citi’s five interconnected businesses, partially offset by a decline in All Other. Excluding divestiture-related impacts in both periods, revenues were up 9%. Net income was $4.0 billion, compared to $3.2 billion in the prior-year period, driven by the higher revenues, partially offset by higher cost of credit and higher expenses. Earnings per share of $1.96 increased from $1.52 per diluted share in the prior-year period, reflecting the higher net income and lower shares outstanding. Percentage comparisons throughout this press release are calculated for the second quarter 2025 versus the second quarter 2024, unless otherwise specified.  Citi CEO Jane Fraser said, “We reported another very good quarter and continue to demonstrate that our strong results are sustainable through different environments. We’re improving the performance of each of our businesses to take share and drive higher returns. With revenue up 8%, Services continues to show why this high-return business is our crown jewel. Markets had its best second quarter performance since 2020 with a record second quarter for Equities. Banking revenues were up 18% and we continue to be at the center of some of the most significant transactions. Wealth revenues were up 20% with solid growth across all three lines of business. In U.S. Personal Banking, we saw good growth in Branded Cards while Retail Banking benefited from higher deposit spreads. We returned $3 billion in capital during the quarter, including $2 billion in share repurchases as part of our $20 billion repurchase plan. I’m particularly pleased that the momentum across our franchise includes the Transformation, as we streamline processes, drive automation and deploy AI. As I’ve said, next year’s 10–11% ROTCE target is a waypoint, not a destination. The actions we’ve taken have set up Citi to succeed long term, drive returns above that level and continue to create value for shareholders,” Ms. Fraser concluded. Citigroup Inc. today reported net income for the second quarter 2025 of $4.0 billion, or $1.96 per diluted share, on revenues of $21.7 billion. This compares to net income of $3.2 billion, or $1.52 per diluted share, on revenues of $20.0 billion for the second quarter 2024.

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Wells Fatgo 2Q25 reported net interest income decreased 2%, driven by the impact of lower interest rates on floating rate assets and changes in deposit mix, partially offset by lower market funding and reduced deposit pricing. Noninterest income increased 4%, reflecting the gain from the merchant services joint venture acquisition, higher asset-based fees in Wealth and Investment Management due to improved market valuations, and an increase in investment banking fees, partially offset by lower net gains from trading in the Markets business

Consumer Banking and Lending (CBL)- Total revenue was up 2% year-over-year and up 4% from the first quarter of 2025. Consumer and Small Business Banking (CSBB) rose 3% year-over-year, driven by higher net interest income, and increased 5% from 1Q25 due to higher net interest income and seasonally higher debit card interchange income. Home Lending was down 5% from 1Q25, primarily reflecting lower mortgage servicing income resulting from portfolio run-off and sales. Credit Card revenue increased 9% year-over-year on higher loan balances. Auto declined 15% year-over-year due to lower loan balances and loan spread compression. Personal Lending was down 9% year-over-year, driven by lower loan balances. Mobile active customers- 32.1 million in 2Q25 up from 31.8 million in 1Q25

Commercial Banking (CB)- Total revenue was down 6% year-over-year but up modestly from the first quarter of 2025. Net interest income declined 13% year-over-year due to the impact of lower interest rates, partially offset by lower deposit pricing and higher deposit and loan balances. Noninterest income rose 13% year-over-year, driven by higher revenue from tax credit investments and increased treasury management fees. Noninterest expense increased 1% year-over-year as higher operating costs were partially offset by lower personnel expenses, reflecting the impact of efficiency initiatives; expenses were down 9% from 1Q25.

Chief Executive Officer Charlie Scharf commented, “Our second quarter results reflect the progress we are making to consistently produce stronger financial results with net income and diluted earnings per share up from both the first quarter and a year ago. Our efforts to increase fee-based income drove revenue growth and both net interest income and noninterest income grew from the first quarter. We are investing in our businesses but remain focused on expense management. While there continue to be risks as we look forward, activity levels have remained consistent and our strong credit performance continues to point to the strength of our commercial and consumer customers’ financial position.” Scharf continued, “The lifting of the asset cap in the second quarter marked a pivotal milestone in Wells Fargo’s ongoing transformation, along with the termination of thirteen consent orders since 2019, including seven this year alone. We are a far stronger company today because of the work we’ve done. This is a huge accomplishment, and I appreciate the focus and dedication that was required of everyone at Wells Fargo. We now have the opportunity to grow in ways we could not while the asset cap was in place and are able to move forward more aggressively to serve consumers, businesses, and communities to support U.S. economic growth.” He concluded, “As we have been investing to drive organic growth and improve the earnings capacity in each of our businesses, we have also been returning excess capital to shareholders. During the first half of this year, we repurchased over $6 billion of common stock and as previously announced, we expect to increase our third quarter common stock dividend by 12.5%, subject to approval by the Company’s Board of Directors at its regularly scheduled meeting later this month.”

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While JPMorgan’s decision to charge for data access may not be unreasonable, it did catch many by surprise. The bank argues that aggregators are profiting from its infrastructure without contributing value in return. Citing rising infrastructure and security costs, as well as a desire for greater control over how consumer data is accessed and used, JPMorgan framed the move as a necessary step toward a more balanced data-sharing ecosystem. For data aggregators, the news is far from welcome. As one spokesperson noted, their cost of goods sold has essentially been zero. They charge fintechs for data access but haven’t had to pay banks to obtain the data itself. If banks like JPMorgan begin charging for that access, aggregators will likely pass the added costs to fintechs, which could ultimately trickle down to consumers. JPMorgan’s announcement comes at an interesting time for open banking in the US. Section 1033 of the Dodd Frank Act was supposed to be finalized this October, and many were looking forward to the clarity that centralized open banking rules would provide the industry. Earlier this year, however, the CFPB announced plans to rescind 1033. Regardless of whether or not formal rules are in place, however, the argument centralizes around an age-old question in fintech–who owns the customer data? While many banks claim that the consumer data belongs to them, some advocacy groups and aggregators claim that consumers should be able to do what they want with their data freely. Introducing new costs to access consumer financial data could have several ripple effects on the future of open banking in the US:

• It may create barriers for fintechs offering services that consumers can’t get from traditional banks. This could slow innovation and reduce incentives for new entrants to build products that meet unmet financial needs.
• Consumers may face higher costs as fintechs pass on the fees associated with data access. Services that were once free or low-cost could become more expensive, prompting some users to reconsider their primary financial institution if their bank can’t match the functionality they previously enjoyed via third-party apps.
• It could accelerate the adoption of more secure, standardized data-sharing protocols, such as those developed by the Financial Data Exchange (FDX), which aim to replace legacy methods like screen scraping with tokenized, API-based access.
• It might also incentivize more screen scraping, as aggregators seek ways to avoid new costs. While most aggregators treat screen scraping as a last resort, increased financial pressure may push some to lean more heavily on automated tools such as AI agents to extract data through less secure channels

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ETF experts say as more major fund companies add actively managed portfolios, it will help to shape the ETF industry’s long-term future. Case in point is the biggest index fund company of all, Vanguard. Vanguard has launched eight active fixed-income ETFs. Roger Hallam, Vanguard global head of rates, cites these strategies in being integral for generating repeatable returns for clients. “We’re very focused on delivering bottom-up security selection to ensure that our alpha generation is as high information as it can be, so that we deliver repeatable returns for our investors over the investment cycle” Hallam said on a recent CNBC “ETF Edge” segment. The Vanguard ETFs include an ultra-short treasury ETF (VGUS), a 0-3 month T-Bill ETF (VBIL), a short duration bond ETF (VSDB), and a long-term tax exempt bond ETF (VTEL) amongst others. ETF experts caution that there is a big difference between adding active strategies to add return potential around a portfolio core of index holdings and becoming market timer, with the latter still a mistake too many investors make when markets are volatile. In the equities space, some of the newest active approaches are designed to limit risk in the stock market rather than ratchet risk up. Amid a year which already experienced one huge market drop, it’s important for investors to not over-correct based on short-term swings in performance. But active strategies make sense in ETFs, according to BlackRock’s U.S. Head of Equity ETFs Jay Jacobs, for reasons that go beyond the recent bond and stock market volatility. The ETF experts also say that investors may seek more return generation from active approaches if the last decade of market returns proves to be unrepeatable. The ultra-low interest rate policies from the Federal Reserve which boosted the performance of the stock market in particular are not expected to return, and that has implications for what investor can expect from their core holdings. The shift to more of these active strategies marks not only a significant change in how asset managers are tweaking their ETF portfolio lineups, but in how investors are approaching the market. 

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The institution where a consumer chooses to seek advice becomes their financial hub, even if it doesn’t hold every account that the consumer has. Advice and financial tools — and help implementing them — helps earn trust, which drives connections. Trust will lead consumers to be willing to give their banks access to accounts with other providers, and use digital tools to create a picture of their finances across all relationships, not just those the institution currently has. Jennifer White, senior director for banking and payments intelligence at J.D. Power noted that the highest-ranking large and regional banks in the study have figured this out. The top five players are Bank of America, U.S. Bank, Chase, First Citizens Bank and Citibank. White says three factors have either propelled institutions further up the study ranking, or helped them keep their places. The first factor is the volume of periodic advice that customers receive from their institution. The second factor is personalization of the advice. The third factor is providing practical help that the customer needs. “The highest movers in the study seemed to be making gains in helping customers understand how they’re spending their money, whether it is through a sit-down financial wellness review, digital spending categorization tools, or a banner or an email alerting them to where their money is going,” says White.

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For the second time in three weeks the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has published a highly critical paper about stablecoins. The previous one outlined how stablecoins are “unsound money” and the latest is entitled “Stablecoin growth – policy challenges and approaches”. The focus is on the challenges, with only hints about approaches and the need for a “more restrictive regime”. This latest paper focuses on three key policy challenges. First are concerns about anti money laundering and the borderless nature of stablecoins. Here the authors fail to fully acknowledge the tremendous progress that has already been made in this regard, with many crypto exchanges now falling into line.  “While stablecoin issuers and exchanges can freeze balances, and occasionally do so at the request of public authorities for high-profile cases of financial crime, employing a request-based approach for billions of transactions with pseudonymous addresses would quickly overwhelm the capacity of those authorities,” the authors wrote. There’s no mention of the many services that already exist to monitor transactions, such as Chainalysis and TRM Labs. AI might come in handy as well. The next issue is monetary sovereignty, which is a genuinely tricky one. The authors note that stablecoins unsurprisingly become popular during bouts of high inflation or exchange rate volatility. Many individuals don’t see why they should pay the price of what is sometimes (not always) economic mismanagement. At the same time, by using stablecoins they exacerbate the problem and the less tech savvy can be impacted even more. There is a real risk of dollarization. While that is problematic on its own in many countries, we’d add that the timing is also not good – with the dollar less likely to be as reliably strong in the future. The third issue is the use of Treasury bills to back stablecoins, impacting the markets and potentially interest rates. That’s especially the case if there are sudden shifts in and out of stablecoins. In terms of the policy approaches, there were only hints. The authors conclude that “same risks, same regulations” doesn’t apply because of the cross border nature of stablecoins combined with localized regulations. 

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Gunjan Kedia, President and CEO, U.S. Bancorp said, “In the second quarter we posted diluted earnings per share of $1.11, delivered a return on tangible common equity of 18% and posted a return on average assets of 1.08%. Importantly, year-over-year top-line revenue growth, coupled with our continued expense discipline, resulted in 250 basis points of positive operating leverage, as adjusted, and an efficiency ratio of 59.2% for the quarter. Our results showcased continued momentum across several of our diversified fee income businesses, which now represent approximately 42% of company-wide revenue. Our fee growth was led by payment services revenue, trust and investment management fees, and treasury management fees, which benefited from greater interconnectedness across the franchise and self-funded investments in our organic growth. Our asset quality metrics held steady this quarter with a net charge-off ratio of 59 basis points, and our continued capital levels remain strong. As we look ahead, we remain committed to executing on our strategic priorities and making disciplined progress towards achieving our medium-term financial targets. Our diversified business mix and sound risk management culture remain strengths, especially at a time of economic volatility. On behalf of all my U.S. Bank colleagues, I would like to thank our clients and shareholders, for their loyalty and support of our exceptional company.”

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