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JP Morgan and Houlihan Lokey led the financial advisers ranking for mergers and acquisitions (M&A) value and volume, respectively, in North America for the first quarter (Q1) of 2024, according to GlobalData’s latest financial advisers league table.

Sustainability-linked bonds – a large part of the financial industry’s arsenal in the war on fossil fuel usage – are failing to hit their mark. Not least, says the head of think-tank Anthropocene Fixed Income Institute (AFII), because traders have not appreciated how the products should trade.

The US Federal Trade Commission’s action to ban non-compete agreements has left Wall Street businesses rushing to restructure contracts and find new ways to tie down the high-priced personnel that their business models rely on. The contracts, which constrain a worker’s ability to work for a competitor for a certain period of time after leaving their current employer, have long been a hallmark at big banks, brokers, asset managers and hedge funds.

The broker-dealer space is undergoing significant transformation with the number of U.S. brokerage firms continuing to shrink. There were 3,378 firms registered with FINRA in 2023, a decrease of 16 firms from 2022, 229 firms from 2018 and 1,448 firms from 2017, according to the regulator’s 2023 Industry Snapshot report. David Choate, COO at CAPIS said that fixed costs continue to rise, while the overall commission pool shrinks: “This leads to one of only two growth possibilities – broker-dealers must take market share or buy market share”.

Nomura Holdings Inc.’s earnings climbed as soaring fixed-income trading and resurgent markets in Japan helped Chief Executive Officer Kentaro Okuda achieve the first increase in annual profit under his watch.