Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) reported fourth-quarter earnings results yesterday morning and the results disappointed investors.Wealth management revenue fell 6% while equity trading revenue and investment banking revenue came in flat. Looking at the daily chart of Morgan Stanley we see that the stock has been trending lower within the confines of a downward sloped trend channel.

Expectations for a decreased oil supply, potential Chinese stimulus and political uncertainty are buoying hopes for gains in the commodities sector, according to Goldman Sachs.Read More...

Shares of the American multinational investment bank and financial services company, Goldman Sachs, rose nearly 7.1% on Wednesday after the firm posted a fourth-quarter profit that convincingly exceeded analyst expectations. Strength in its investment banking and investing and lending divisions contributed most to the quarter's results.  The bank reported an EPS of $6.04 per share for the fourth quarter, far outstripping analysts’ estimate of $4.45 per share. Giving a much needed boost to a strengthening banking sector, the New York-based bank posted a net revenue of $8.08 billion, beating the analyst estimate of $7.55 billion.Total interest income for the quarter stood at $991 million, after an increase of ~16% from Q3 and 10% from the year-ago quarter. Driven by a 56% surge in advisory revenue to $1.20 billion, the bank reported revenue of $2.04 billion in its investment banking division compared to analysts’ estimate of $1.88 billion.

Morgan Stanley is shifting its focus from defensive stocks to cyclical stocks as Wall Street starts pulling away from bear market territory, chief U.S. equity strategist Michael Wilson told CNBC on Tuesday. READ MORE...

Windstream Holdings Inc. announced recently that it sold its EarthLink consumer internet business to private equity firm Trive Capital for $330 million in cash.Regarding the company’s decision to sell its EarthLink consumer internet segment, Tony Thomas - president and CEO of Windstream - announced, "This transaction enables us to divest a non-core segment and focus exclusively on our two largest business units.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) has fined Morgan Stanley $10M for compliance failures and anti-money laundering.The lapse impaired the firm's overall tracking of tens of billions of dollars of wire and foreign currency transfers, FINRA said. Those transactions included transfers to and from countries known for money laundering risk, FINRA said.

A second former Goldman Sachs banker was charged by the Malaysia government in connection with an alleged money-laundering scheme at the state-run fund 1MDB. This week, the government also filed charges against Goldman Sachs in connection with its role as underwriter of bond sales that raised $6.5 billion for 1MDB.Tim Leissner, a former partner for Goldman Sachs in Asia, was also charged this week. For its part, Goldman Sachs denies wrongdoing and on said certain members of the former Malaysian government and 1MDB lied to the bank about the proceeds of the bond sales.

Goldman is already under investigation in the U.S., and now Malaysian authorities claim that Goldman misled investors when the bank knew sales from a 1MDB (a state investment fund) bond offering it arranged would be misappropriated. “Their fraud goes to the heart of our capital markets,” Malaysian Attorney General Tommy Thomas said in a statement.“If no criminal proceedings are instituted against the accused, their undermining of our financial system and market integrity will go unpunished.” The government is seeking fines for the $2.7 billion of allegedly misused funds and the $600 million in fees received by the bank.

Goldman Sachs faces criminal charges from officials in Malaysia, over the investment banks’ role in the misappropriation of multi-billion dollars from a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund. Goldman had arranged and underwritten bond sales for 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) in 2012 and 2013.Two former Goldman Sachs employees, and two others connected to 1MDB, will face the criminal charges.  Goldman Sachs, however, said in in an emailed statement to TheStreet, "We believe these charges are misdirected, will vigorously defend them and look forward to the opportunity to present our case," while adding,  "the firm continues to cooperate with all authorities investigating these matters.

The $17.5 million investment will give a boost to the Israeli-based company that sells technology to help financial firms handle business errors.  These errors may include data discrepancies between counter-parties on the financial terms of a trade or wrong information used to identify a client.Errors are normally handled manually, via numerous phone calls and emails between various firms, but AccessFintech's technology will help reduce the time and resources needed to resolve these issues by helping financial institutions communicate with each other.

Bloomberg is reporting that Morgan Stanley is shutting its Moscow equities and currency trading desks.The bank is planning to move some employees to London while others will be cut entirely. The report goes on to say that its presence in Moscow will be focused on corporate finance, capital markets, and mergers and acquisitions. “Morgan Stanley remains committed to Russia and will maintain our longstanding on-the-ground presence in Moscow and ensure that our clients in Russia continue to benefit from the capabilities of the firm, in particular as it relates to investment banking and global capital markets,” the bank said in a statement.

As 2018 comes to a close, investors are turning their attention to the market outlook for 2019.And Wall Street’s top strategists are offering some guidance. READ MORE...

The six year old company (SIMON) is being purchased by JP Morgan Chase, HSBC Holdings, and Credit Suisse Group AG's NEXT Investors. Goldman retains a minority interest in the service, which will operate as an independent entity.Financial terms weren’t disclosed within the announcement, but Bloomberg is reporting that that SIMON is valued at just over $75 million. The bank started the platform to help retail brokers offer structured notes, and it was meant to attract rivals to sell the securities. “We are very, very bullish on what an industry platform with those participants can do in terms of growth for the market,” said Jason Broder, who leaves his position as head of Goldman’s private investor products group to become SIMON’s chief executive officer.  

Warren Buffett poured $4 billion into JPMorgan Chase (JMP) in Q3, according to Berkshire Hathaway's (BRKB) latest 13-F filing, which also showed a bigger stake in Apple (AAPL). READ MORE...

International Petroleum Investment Co. and Abar Investments PJS filed a complaint Wednesday seeking unspecified damages. The funds allege that Goldman paid privates to a former manager of IPIC and former CEO of Abar Investments.Bloomberg is reporting that Tim Leissner, Goldman Sachs’s former chairman of Southeast Asia, admitted in a plea that he bribed officials to get bond deals and said a culture of secrecy at the investment bank led him to conceal wrongdoing from compliance staff.

Goldman is embroiled in a corruption probe that started with Malaysia's finance minister, Lim Guan Eng, saying he would seek a refund over bond deals for its sovereign wealth fund.He added that Goldman has "admitted culpability" after a former banker admitted guilt for his role in the scandal. Bloomberg reports that three senior Goldman bankers were implicated in a Department of Justice criminal enterprise that involved bribing Malaysian officials as well as laundering money.

Coins skyrocketed in value, leading to increased media coverage; more media coverage meant greater public recognition of (and interest in) crypto and blockchain than ever before.2018 has seen the climate around cryptocurrency regain some semblance of normalcy – something that Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin described in an interview with Bloomberg as a “ceiling” after the intense growth of the previous year. According to Buterin, the so-called ceiling exists because the promotional strategy of blockchain and cryptocurrency’s nascent days – using marketing as a way to drive adoption – is reaching a “dead end,” the byproduct of increased public awareness in the wake of 2017.

Gold is set to have its biggest miner. Canada's Barrick Gold is buying rival Randgold, and the merged company will be more than $18 billion in market value.According to the two companies' statement on Monday, the new entity will control five of the world's top ten gold mines and have "the largest gold ‎reserves amongst senior gold peers". John Thornton, Barrick's executive chairman who will continue to hold the position in the new company, indicated that the focus will be on boosting returns versus the number of ounces produced.

Wells Fargo & Company is set to slash jobs by about 5 percent to 10 percent within the next three years . The fourth largest bank in the U.S. said that the latest employee retrenchment plan - which could total up to 26,450 job cuts - includes displacements as well as normal team-member attrition.The job cuts are seen as part of Wells Fargo’s goal to lower costs by $4 billion by 2020. Wells Fargo will also reduce its branch count by about 800 by 2020 and sell non-core businesses.

JP Morgan Chase & Co. gifts its shareholders a 42.9% hike in quarterly dividends. The investment bank’s Board of Directors announced new quarterly dividends of 80 cents per share (up from around 56 cents) that will be paid out on Oct 31.These have been approved by the Federal Reserve. JP Morgan's latest dividend increase follows its earlier 12% hike to 56 cents per share in September 2017.