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...
M. Suhail M&T Bank ( MTB ) turned in earnings that exceeded the average analyst estimate on Wednesday as it continued to invest in its businesses. Its outlook for 2026 net interest income is roughly in line with consensus, while its guidance for fee income was stronger than the average estimate. The company expects 2026 net interest income, on a taxable-equivalent basis, to reach $7.2B-$7.35B (vs....
M. Suhail M&T Bank ( MTB ) turned in earnings that exceeded the average analyst estimate on Wednesday as it continued to invest in its businesses. Its outlook for 2026 net interest income is roughly in line with consensus, while its guidance for fee income was stronger than the average estimate. The company expects 2026 net interest income, on a taxable-equivalent basis, to reach $7.2B-$7.35B (vs. Visible Alpha consensus of $7.26B) and fee income of $2.675B-$2.775B (vs. Visible Alpha estimate of $2.66B). GAAP expense is expected to be $5.5B-$5.6B for the year vs. the Visible Alpha consensus of $5.6B. Q1 operating EPS of $4.18, beating the average analyst estimate of $4.01, fell from $4.72 in Q4 2025 and rose from $3.38 in Q1 2025. Q1 revenue of $2.44B, topping the $2.43 consensus, declined from $2.48B in the previous quarter and increased from $2.31B a year ago. Taxable-equivalent net interest income was $1.76B, vs. the Visible Alpha consensus of $1.77B, dropping from $1.79B in the prior quarter and climbing from $1.71B in the year-ago period. Noninterest income of $689M dropped from $696M in Q4 and $611M in last year’s Q1. Provision for credit losses of $140M compared with $125M in the previous quarter and $130M a year ago. Average loans grew to $138.4B from $137.6B in Q4. Average deposits fell to $164.3B from $165.1B in the prior quarter. "M&T continued to produce strong operating results and return capital to its shareholders in the recent quarter while investing in its businesses and expanding its operational capabilities in support of our strategic objectives of operational excellence and teaming for growth to meet the needs of our customers and make a difference in people's lives," said Chief Financial Officer Daryl N. Bible. Conference call at 8:00 AM ET. More on M&T Bank M&T Bank: A Defensive Holding In An Uncertain Market M&T Bank Corporation (MTB) Presents at RBC Capital Markets Global Financial Institutions Conference 2026 Transcript M&T Bank Non-GAAP EPS...
szakalikus/iStock via Getty Images By Bert Colijn , Chief Economist, Netherlands Eurozone production ticked up in February, but by just 0.4% compared to January. That leaves production levels below most of 2025. And the surge in energy prices has put further pressure on energy-intensive industries as of March. Don’t expect a rebound soon. Eurozone industry has been very resilient throughout 2025 d...
szakalikus/iStock via Getty Images By Bert Colijn , Chief Economist, Netherlands Eurozone production ticked up in February, but by just 0.4% compared to January. That leaves production levels below most of 2025. And the surge in energy prices has put further pressure on energy-intensive industries as of March. Don’t expect a rebound soon. Eurozone industry has been very resilient throughout 2025 despite significant trade turmoil. But the start of 2026 has not been encouraging. As front-loading by American businesses has eased, production levels have dropped again. And while manufacturers have become more optimistic on infrastructure and defence investment promises, the Middle East war has dashed hopes of a broad-based rebound. Energy-intensive industries, in particular, are set to suffer from higher prices. The February increase in production was not at all broad-based. Germany, France and the Netherlands experienced declines in industrial output, while Italy experienced a slight uptick. Ireland – notorious for volatile production data – saw an increase of 5.7% in February. Production categories also haven’t shown a clear trend in recent months. With the war in the Middle East starting in March, expect more downward pressure on production to come through. Energy-intensive industry will see its competitiveness come under renewed pressure, and uncertainty could feed through to investment decisions. While other – mainly high-tech – sectors could continue to perform very well, we do note that downside risks for production have increased. Content Disclaimer This publication has been prepared by ING solely for information purposes irrespective of a particular user's means, financial situation or investment objectives. The information does not constitute investment recommendation, and nor is it investment, legal or tax advice or an offer or solicitation to purchase or sell any financial instrument. Read more Original Post Editor's Note: The summary bullets for this article...
The growing dominance of a handful of banks supplying billions of dollars to help juice bets at hedge funds and proprietary trading firms is sparking new financial stability risks, ratings agency S&P Global Inc. warned. Its latest analysis shows disclosed revenues relating to “markets financing” at four major investment banks — BNP Paribas SA , Barclays Plc , Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan St...
The growing dominance of a handful of banks supplying billions of dollars to help juice bets at hedge funds and proprietary trading firms is sparking new financial stability risks, ratings agency S&P Global Inc. warned. Its latest analysis shows disclosed revenues relating to “markets financing” at four major investment banks — BNP Paribas SA , Barclays Plc , Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley — jumped 25% between 2024 and 2025 to more than $24 billion, representing roughly 30% of these firms’ markets business at that time. Such scale and concentration creates a risk to financial stability, the S&P report warned. Banks’ prime-brokerage units — which includes a range of services to hedge funds and other investment firms — exceeded $2.5 trillion of lending in 2024, a figure that has doubled over the past four years, the report said. Hedge funds’ use of borrowed money to fuel their bets — known as leverage — has approached historic highs while assets overseen by those firms hit a record $5 trillion last year. Regulatory concerns around non-bank investment firms have heightened since the collapse of Archegos Capital Management LP saddled lenders with $10 billion of losses in 2021 and and hastened the demise of Credit Suisse Group. They have also scrutinized whether these funds have become too big to fail given their increasing presence in vital markets such as those for US and UK government bonds. “A small network of global banks has underpinned nonbank trading firms’ ascent to the center of the financial ecosystem,” the report said. “Together with record leverage and scale and the concentration of such exposures in a handful of banks, this means the ecosystem exhibits an inherent fragility that could be tested under severe stress,” it added, citing a potential impact on bank ratings. Data is also limited in this area, given many firms do not disclose such information, S&P said, adding the true scale is difficult to quantify. That said, risk of failures includi...
DragonImages/iStock via Getty Images It seems to me that the 'golden child' of for-profit ed has surprised Wall St. again, hasn't it? Well, a little over two months ago I kind of entered the debate with the bears of Grand Canyon Education ( LOPE ) and showed you why this wasn't a broken company just because they interrupted a 13-quarter double-beat cycle. Sounds like an exaggeration, I know. But t...
DragonImages/iStock via Getty Images It seems to me that the 'golden child' of for-profit ed has surprised Wall St. again, hasn't it? Well, a little over two months ago I kind of entered the debate with the bears of Grand Canyon Education ( LOPE ) and showed you why this wasn't a broken company just because they interrupted a 13-quarter double-beat cycle. Sounds like an exaggeration, I know. But the stock really dropped more than 20% post Q3 FY 2025 earnings, and that quickly became the narrative. Seeking Alpha I don't know about you, but when one of the best students in the class gets a C or D, you don't expect them to keep getting low grades. Same thing the other way around. I was more of a C student, so when I pulled an A, that was basically a once-a-year event. If you want to use an allegory (a very fitting one, since we're talking about universities), if for-profit stocks were in a classroom, GCE would be that student who only gets high grades. To vary things a bit, this time they reported an EPS beat once again. That's 14 consecutive quarters (if we exclude the last in-line quarter from the comparison, of course) exceeding Wall Street EPS estimates. But you know what's funny? The stock barely moved in the post-earnings period! If you ask me, investors are still spooked by the energy-driven stagflation narrative and end up forgetting that this environment can be good for for-profit ed, especially around retraining and job-focused programs. It's no coincidence that before the new 'asset-light' zeitgeist for education, these stocks were countercyclical, since in bad economies people went back to college. Almost all for-profit ed stocks outperformed the S&P during the GFC (Seeking Alpha) Factor also that a lot of enrollments are now B2B; the default risk looks a lot lower. That's the good thing about not depending on 'bad enrollments' like universities did in the past. Phoenix Education Partners ( PXED ) was a great example before Apollo ( APO ) took the reins. Bu...