Today the NYT highlighted (link below) that Goldman Sachs is one of the only banks still investing and trading heavily, and they're seeing massive loss in profitability. What is causing this? Is fin tech automating it? Is someone else moving into the space?
Link:http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/20/business/dealbook/goldman-sachss-profit-and-revenue-tumble-in-quarter.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share
I don't know how is the situation in GS but in Europe many investment banks are under serious trouble, even if we exclude the effects of periphericals debt crisis. Turnover in primary markets has stagnated due to excess credit capacity and a (structural) small number of companies wanting to go public. On secondary markets, trading in equities and bonds has reached a plateau ages ago with liquidity seeming more and more artificial and regulations decreasing risk taking massively. Costs are also increasing due to regulation (huge in Europe) and necessary change in outdated technology. Asset management starting to feel the heat from indexing and ETFs... Fintech is not there yet but at some point it will cause massive disruption because margins are going to be way way lower. It sure looks like a death by a thousand cuts... CLSA analyst Mike Mayo has nailed it perfectly not only for GS but for the industry as a whole: “You danced pretty well the last three to four years without revenue growth. But it seems like you’re getting to the end of what you can do.”