Goldman Sachs reported its highest quarterly profits in five years, as a record performance by its equities traders picked up the slack from an unexpected drop in fixed-income revenues.
The Wall Street bank reported first-quarter net income of $5.6 billion (€4.5 billion), up 19 per cent from a year ago and better than the $5.3 billion analysts had expected.
Goldman’s equities traders delivered revenues of $5.3 billion. That was ahead of the $4.9 billion expected and up 27 per cent from the first quarter a year ago.
The bank’s fixed income, currencies and commodities traders badly missed forecasts, however. The business reported a 10 per cent drop in revenues to $4 billion, rather than the 10 per cent increase analysts had priced in.
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Investment banking fees rose almost 50 per cent from a year ago to $2.8 billion, ahead of estimates for $2.5 billion.
Even with the decline in revenues in its fixed-income unit, it was the third-best quarter for Goldman’s trading business in its history.
New regulation in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis pushed banks like Goldman to focus more on facilitating and financing trades for other investors.
These businesses benefit when markets are volatile, like in the first quarter where there was frantic trading around the US military operation in Venezuela and the conflict in the Middle East, which triggered a sharp increase in oil prices.
Goldman’s chief executive David Solomon said the “geopolitical landscape remains very complex”, and the bank cautioned that its backlog of future investment banking fees decreased slightly, from a record level three months ago.
The bank reported that revenues at its asset and wealth management division increased 10 per cent to $4.1 billion.
These money management businesses are central to Goldman’s efforts to make earnings less reliant on the cyclical businesses of investment banking and trading. --Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026
