There’s always someone who profits from a crisis, and in the case of the 2025 tariff trade wars, it seems that it’s Wall Street’s biggest banks such as JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Goldman Sachs (GS) who are smiling.
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Best Performance in a Decade
According to a report in the Financial Times, the banks – JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley(MS), Bank of America (BAC) and Citigroup (C) – have reaped around $37 billion in revenues in the first quarter of the year. That marks their best performance in over a decade, and they have largely the new Donald Trump administration to thank.
The market volatility caused by a series of President Trump announcements as he unleashed staggeringly high reciprocal tariffs on most countries in the world, as well as uncertainty over his strategy towards Ukraine and the Middle East, has left investors frantically fretting over their stock market portfolios. That has created opportunities for traders looking to take advantage both of short-term market swings but also scooping up some devalued stocks for the long-term.
Stocks Are Down
Indeed, stock trading was the highlight for the five big banks during the quarter, with revenues rising to about $16 billion, up 34% from the same time last year. All the banks reported record revenues from equities trading, with total revenues from fixed income trading up 6% to around $21 billion, the highest since the height of the Covid pandemic in 2020.
However, even Trump’s turmoil has had its claws out for the wolves of Wall Street. Investment banking activity has been somewhat restrained in the last few months, with buyers and sellers of companies deciding to remain on the sidelines rather than doing deals during these turbulent times.
The share prices of the major banks have been going only one way since the start of 2025. JPM stock is down 5% over the last three months, Goldman Sachs is off 14%, MS is 15% lower, BAC is down 18% and Citigroup is 16% lower.
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