JPMorgan says Goldman Sachs is its top investment banking stock — and picks 7 more to buy

Published Sun, Jun 27 20217:30 PM EDT

The future of investment banking is changing, and JPMorgan has named eight stocks that it thinks will benefit. "The Investment Banking (IB) industry, in our view, is in a much better shape today compared to where it has ever been," the bank said in an analyst note this week. It sees four primary reasons for that: Lower risk thanks to a shift to more sustainable and less capital-intensive business, higher barriers for entry, more "sustainable" revenue streams and an increasing share of captive wealth management. . Captive funds are usually described as private investments managed for a select group of people. In the years since the 2008 financial crisis, investment banking revenues saw low growth as a result of regulatory headwinds leading to a reduction in capital. Now, the bank sees "most regulatory headwinds and litigation behind us," and says the industry is positioned for "undiscounted growth." Here are the bank's top picks: Within the global investment banking space, JPMorgan names its U.S. favorites as Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley , with the former its top global investment bank pick. "We see GS as a contender given its agile culture, which allows it to move as a Fintech, and its strong IT platform to retain its strong market share growth momentum from Tier II players," the bank's analysts said in the research note. For Europe, their winner is Barclays . "In Europe, Barclays is our preferred IB pick as we see it as a relative winner with its transaction bank providing an advantage along with its diversified IB revenue mix, allowing double-digit returns through the cycle — unlike all other European players," the analysts wrote. Swiss lender UBS is the next favorite on the list, despite the hit to its earnings earlier this year from the scandal involving Archegos Capital . "We see MS (Morgan Stanley) and UBS as Equity S & T (sales and trading) players" supported by their captive wealth management franchises Its next picks are French investment banks Societe Generale , BNP Paribas , Germany's Deutsche Bank and Swiss lender Credit Suisse . The bank puts its long-term base case revenue assumptions at 5% per year. But it thinks these are "conservative," given they don't take into account things like market share gains, China opening up its capital markets, Europe's securitization market slowly opening up, and the drive toward ESG (environmental, social and governance) changes introducing new innovations.

The Goldman Sachs logo on a smartphone screen.

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The future of investment banking is changing, and JPMorgan has named eight stocks that it thinks will benefit.