JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs continued to dominate investment banking in 2021, extending their lead at the top of the table for fees from debt and equity underwriting, M&A advisory and syndicated loans during another record year for such activity.
JP Morgan retained its position at the top of the table for the 12th year in a row, seeing its total fees rise 40% to US$12.9bn, outstripping the overall market, which saw fees increase 22% to US$159.5bn, according to Refinitiv data.
Goldman also had a good year, with its total fees rising 38% to US$11.5bn, leaving it comfortably ahead of third-placed Morgan Stanley, whose fees went up 28% to U$9.1bn, meaning it was able to swap places with Bank of America, whose fees only rose 18% to US$8.7bn.
Strikingly, JP Morgan and Goldman were both able to grow market share significantly over the bumper year, with the former seeing its share surge 107bp to 8.11% and the latter registering an 82bp rise to 7.21%.
Goldman Sachs began to see the benefit of its financing policies pay off. It has started to grow its balance sheet through its retail banking arm and is now deploying some of this capacity by extending loans to M&A and other corporate clients.
In 2021, it was now the third most active bank in syndicated loans, after JP Morgan and BofA, with a 3.94% share of overall fees here. Arch-rival Morgan Stanley, which is its nearest competitor in equity capital markets, was only 11th in the loans table.
All the other top seven banks enjoyed top 10 positions in all four categories. BofA’s prowess in debt, both bonds and loans, where it nabbed second place, put it some way ahead of compatriot Citigroup, whose overall fees rose 18% to US$6.8bn.
Credit Suisse just managed to retain sixth position thanks to a strong showing in M&A advisory, where it has a 3.51% market share. Its total fees only rose 8% to US$4.6bn, putting it just US$86m ahead of Barclays, which remained in seventh place after a 19% rise in fees to US$4.5bn.
Deutsche Bank also kept its eighth spot, but was some way behind its European rivals, recording only US$3.1bn of fees overall, up 25% on the previous year. It was almost overhauled by Jefferies, which enjoyed a stunning year, seeing its fees jump 44% to US$2.9bn thanks to a strong year in ECM.
That allowed it to move up three places to ninth, leapfrogging Wells Fargo, RBC and BNP Paribas, who all lost market share.