Darren415 Wall Street's top banks notched new records with their first-quarter results, capitalizing on market volatility fueled by the Iran war. JPMorgan Chase ( JPM ) posted its highest-ever trading revenue for the quarter, while Citigroup ( C ) reported its highest quarterly markets revenue in a decade. JPMorgan ( JPM ), Citi ( C ) and Wells Fargo ( WFC ) together reported over $25B of profits ...
Darren415 Wall Street's top banks notched new records with their first-quarter results, capitalizing on market volatility fueled by the Iran war. JPMorgan Chase ( JPM ) posted its highest-ever trading revenue for the quarter, while Citigroup ( C ) reported its highest quarterly markets revenue in a decade. JPMorgan ( JPM ), Citi ( C ) and Wells Fargo ( WFC ) together reported over $25B of profits for the first quarter, as their traders benefited from sharp market moves driven by geopolitical shocks in Venezuela and Iran. Market volatility is good for investment banks as they make money from financing and facilitating client trades. Meanwhile, Wells Fargo ( WFC ) – which is more reliant on retail and commercial banking for its earnings – saw its loan book surpass $1T in the first quarter. Its CEO Charles Scharf noted that while consumers are spending more than a year ago, including on gas, they haven't slowed spending on everything else yet. "We have seen historically that it often takes consumers several months to reduce their spend levels on other categories to adjust for higher oil prices," he added. "And while we don't know the exact timing, we would expect to see the same in the second half of the year." JPMorgan ( JPM ) CFO Jeremy Barnum also pointed to a "resilient consumer that's doing fine" despite higher gas prices. "We've looked to see if there's evidence of people trading, decreasing other discretionary spending to adjust for higher gas prices, but it's just kind of not enough yet to be visible." More on banks Citigroup (C) Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript JPMorgan (JPM) Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript Earnings from banks offer views of private credit exposure Wells Fargo falls after mixed Q1 results, NII below estimates
Apple quietly threatened to kick Elon Musk's AI app, Grok, from its App Store in January over its failure to curb the surge of nonconsensual sexual deepfakes flooding X, according to NBC News . It was a muted show of force from one of tech's most powerful gatekeepers, made behind closed doors even as the undressing crisis unfolded in full public view and criticism over Apple's cowardice mounted. I...
Apple quietly threatened to kick Elon Musk's AI app, Grok, from its App Store in January over its failure to curb the surge of nonconsensual sexual deepfakes flooding X, according to NBC News . It was a muted show of force from one of tech's most powerful gatekeepers, made behind closed doors even as the undressing crisis unfolded in full public view and criticism over Apple's cowardice mounted. In a letter obtained by NBC News , Apple told US senators it "contacted the teams behind both X and Grok after it received complaints and saw news coverage of the scandal" and demanded that the developers "create a plan to improve content moderation." … Read the full story at The Verge.
Goldman Highlights Global Nuclear Progress Across SMRs And The Fuel Chain March saw the submission of multiple construction permits for new reactors, while new designs like India's thorium reactor , obtained their first criticality. Microreactors in the US also progressed through DOE regulatory pathways as they approach a criticality deadline in July. Last month also saw multiple headlines in the ...
Goldman Highlights Global Nuclear Progress Across SMRs And The Fuel Chain March saw the submission of multiple construction permits for new reactors, while new designs like India's thorium reactor , obtained their first criticality. Microreactors in the US also progressed through DOE regulatory pathways as they approach a criticality deadline in July. Last month also saw multiple headlines in the US across the nuclear fuel chain. Uranium pricing in the spot market was relatively flat after the significant pullback in February. GS updated their uranium supply demand model to account for some of the latest updates resulting in a continued gross mismatch over the next couple decades. These nuclear industry updates come in a time of great power competition in the form of an AI race between China and the US. Constellation Energy's CEO Joseph Dominguez recently stated the US is "very behind" China in the race to build up energy to feed AI data centers. Taking into account the fact that China has built the entirety of the US electric system since just 2010 , Dominguez said "we're in some trouble" if building as fast as China is what it takes to win. He additionally argues a restructuring of national grid operations to better manage peak energy demands could more appropriately balance use of the grid and potentially lead to lower energy prices. Goldman Sachs analyst Brian Lee reviews headlines across the nuclear industry for March. New reactor progress and announcements North America 3/16/26 - Canada - Darlington Unit 4 has returned to service at 100% power, completing Ontario Power Generation’s four‑unit Darlington Refurbishment Project, which extends the plant’s operating life by around 30 years; the CAD 12.8 billion programme was finished four months ahead of schedule and CAD 150 million under budget, marking the full return of all four Candu units to operation. 3/26/2026 - United States - NASA plans to launch Space Reactor‑1 Freedom, the first nuclear‑powered interplane...
Dilok Klaisataporn/iStock via Getty Images The market’s reaction to Goldman Sachs’ ( GS ) first quarter (Q1) earnings for FY2026 – made on the 13 th of April 2026 – was striking: despite early trends that the company will repeat the results of Fiscal Year 2025 wherein net earnings registered strong growth over the previous year’s, the stock went on to fall by 2%. There are two specific factors tha...
Dilok Klaisataporn/iStock via Getty Images The market’s reaction to Goldman Sachs’ ( GS ) first quarter (Q1) earnings for FY2026 – made on the 13 th of April 2026 – was striking: despite early trends that the company will repeat the results of Fiscal Year 2025 wherein net earnings registered strong growth over the previous year’s, the stock went on to fall by 2%. There are two specific factors that could be attributed to this immediate conviction – one for the industry that the company operates in and one more generalized for the economy. Trend Drilldown In recent years, Goldman Sachs has been working on transitioning out of the consumer banking business altogether. Early in January, the company announced that it will be transitioning its Apple Card business – which represented the first consumer credit card by Goldman Sachs – to Chase over a period of 2 years. In 2025, it had entirely exited the General Motors card business as well. Meanwhile, some line items have been merging as the company streamlines its business. For example, “Equity Investments” and “Debt Investments” are now reported in aggregate as the bank transitions from direct investments on its balance sheet to a scaled third-party funds-driven business. Previously, the bank would use its own balance sheet to make massive investments (known as “Principal Investments”) into opportunities. Going forward, it would increasingly raise money from outside investors and manage the investment in exchange for “Management Fees” and “Incentive Fees”. The line item merge in this instance is a signal of commitment to the market. While the changes don’t alter the bottom line (i.e. earnings) or the top line (i.e. revenue) in past quarters, it does alter the horizon of the trend line analysis relative to more recent data. Source: Created by Sandeep G. Rao using data from Goldman Sachs' Financial Statements One potentially significant standout in trends is in the company’s steadfast commitment to compensation and benefit...
Cloudflare will benefit from rising demand for cloud computing services as artificial intelligence adoption booms, priming it for solid gains ahead, according to Piper Sandler. The investment firm upgraded cloud name to overweight from neutral. Its $222 price target imply 24.3% upside from Tuesday's close. Piper also said the stock trades at a discount, having lost more than 9% in 2026. "We have l...
Cloudflare will benefit from rising demand for cloud computing services as artificial intelligence adoption booms, priming it for solid gains ahead, according to Piper Sandler. The investment firm upgraded cloud name to overweight from neutral. Its $222 price target imply 24.3% upside from Tuesday's close. Piper also said the stock trades at a discount, having lost more than 9% in 2026. "We have long-viewed Cloudflare as one of our favorite long-term stories given where infrastructure is heading," analyst James Fish said Tuesday in a note to clients. "A great entry point has been hard to come by given this, but we see the recent pullback as a window to get involved." Cloudflare is poised to bring in business through pay-as-you-go computing services, including network-as-a-service (NaaS), secure, access service edge (SASE) and infrastructure as a service (IaaS), according to the analyst. Those cloud computing services allow customers to access and store information in a at a lower cost. But shares have been under pressure this year amid a broader slump in software stocks. That decline has been fueled by concerns that AI could disrupt the industry — a risk that is particularly top of mind for investors following the limited release of Anthropic's Claude Mythos . NET YTD mountain Shares are down 9% in 2026 However, cloud computing services are likely to remain popular, particularly in the age of generative AI. Cloud computing sales are expected to hit $2 trillion by 2030, with generative AI accounting for up to roughly 15% of that spending, according to Goldman Sachs Research. Cloudflare, which already has a working relationship with OpenAI, is poised to be a preferred provider of AI firms, Piper Sandler said. "Cloudflare and its edge-peers should be AI-Infrastructure winners, and specifically for Cloudflare via: 1) Workers / IaaS solutions hosting AI applications; 2) increased use of caching as part of AI-infrastructure, along with increased website traffic; 3) networ...