World's best bank for financial institutions 2018: Morgan Stanley

Few sectors have as diverse a range of requirements as financial institutions. Clients face vastly different challenges worldwide, and it is a rare financial institutions group (FIG) franchise that can rise to all of them. In 2018, that franchise belonged to Morgan Stanley.

Ask any FIG banker what the main market theme of the last 12 months has been and you will probably get a different answer. The advance of fintech, deleveraging, recapitalization, consolidation? Depending on the client, it could be any of them – so as a firm you had better to able to deliver, on them all.

“We have a global reach and focus and a leading position in cross-border transactions,” says John Esposito, global co-head of FIG at Morgan Stanley. “We have really tried to break down silos and have global coverage teams. We are bringing in people to talk about balance sheet and capital holistically.”