Morgan Stanley’s wealth management arm has registered a pre-tax income from continuing operations of $768m for the fourth quarter of 2015, up 4% compared with $736m in the corresponding quarter of 2014.
For the fourth quarter ended 31 December 2015, the unit’s net revenues were $3.8bn and pre-tax margin was 20%.
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The division reported asset management fee revenues of $2.1bn, which were essentially unchanged from a year ago, reflecting the impact of lower markets offset by positive flows.
During the quarter, transactional revenues dropped to $861m from $976m a year ago primarily reflecting lower commission revenues and lower levels of new issue activity.
The wealth management arm posted a net interest income of $779m, an increase of 24% from $625m in the same period a year ago on higher deposit and loan balances.
Total client assets reached $2trillion at the end of the fourth quarter 2015; while client assets in fee based accounts were $795bn and fee based asset flows for the quarter were $11.4bn.
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By GlobalDataThe banking group said in a statement that the unit’s wealth management representatives of 15,889 generated average annualized revenue per representative of $947,000 for the fourth quarter.
According to the bank, wealth management client liabilities stood at $64bn at quarter end, an increase of $13bn compared with the prior year quarter.
Overall, the banking giant has reported net revenues of $7.7bn for the fourth quarter of 2015 compared to $7.8bn for the same period a year ago.
Morgan Stanley chairman and CEO James P. Gorman said: "In the fourth quarter we took action to meaningfully restructure our Fixed Income business on a capital and expense basis. We enter 2016 with a continued focus on managing expenses across the Firm and driving up returns for our shareholders."
