Topic: Growth Stocks

J.P. MORGAN CHASE & CO. $56 – New York symbol JPM

J.P. MORGAN CHASE & CO.
$56
(New York symbol JPM;
Income Portfolio, Finance sector;
Shares outstanding: 3.8 billion;
Market cap: $212.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 2.2;
Dividend yield: 2.9%; TSINetwork Rating: Average;
www.jpmorganchase.com) earned $5.3 billion, or
$1.28 a share, in the three months ended March 31, 2014. That’s down 19.2% from $6.5 billion, or $1.59, a year earlier. Revenue fell 8.5%, to $23.0 billion from $25.1 billion.

Even though interest rates remain relatively low, the slow economy has hurt consumer and business loan demand. As well, revenue from Morgan’s securities trading operations (which account for 37% of the total) fell 15% on weaker volumes. These were the main reasons for the lower results. In addition, Morgan set aside $850 million to cover bad loans, up 37.8% from $617 million a year earlier.

Morgan continues to sell its riskier businesses, including its commodity-trading operations, which buy and sell resources, such as oil, metals and crops. It will receive $3.5 billion when the deal closes in the third quarter of 2014.

The cash will help the bank pay for its plan to buy back $6.5 billion of its shares in the next year. The stock is also cheap at just 9.6 times Morgan’s likely 2014 earnings of $5.86 a share. The $1.60 dividend yields 2.9%.

J.P. Morgan Chase is a buy.

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