North America

When RBS floated Citizens Financial in 2014, it was the biggest bank IPO since the financial crisis and investors were sceptical of its prospects ‒ five years on and RoE and EPS have doubled, the stock trades at a premium, and the bank has shown it can compete with bigger US banks and non-banks alike. Chief executive Bruce Van Saun discusses what comes next.

A deep and sustainable private-label RMBS market has always eluded the US thanks to the insuperable competitive advantage enjoyed by the GSEs; that could change if plans to remove these guarantees for higher-risk mortgages go ahead.

Concern is again growing over unsustainable lending to over-leveraged borrowers, financing vastly overpriced assets that are subsequently securitized; only this time it isn’t mortgages – it’s student loans.

Elizabeth Warren is showing a unique ability to get under the skin of Wall Street leaders as the US presidential election season heats up.

Wall Street leaders alarmed by the prospect of a populist anti-finance president such as Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders were given some hope when Michael Bloomberg declared his candidacy for the Democratic nomination.

A $30 billion bond from AbbVie has given US dollar investment-grade corporate debt volumes a boost late in the year, but net issuance is down and the outlook is mixed. Little visibility on large M&A financings is combining with liability management and late-cycle caution to mean that 2020 might be worse

Why does the tech behemoth want to provide current accounts for users? It’s the data, stupid.

It appears that basic errors rather than deliberate attempts to game the system lay behind Citi’s large miscalculations of UK RWAs and CET1.

A deluge of negative transatlantic headlines overshadows the achievements of Ukraine’s reformers.

A new sport in southeast Asia banking circles is guessing how much it will take for Goldman to settle with the Malaysian state over 1MDB.

The country’s positive real interest rates shine like a beacon for international banks.

Santander targets US retail deposits, as Goldman's Marcus finds online lending tougher than expected.

The benefit of banking digitally is that customers have an immediate record of their spending, but they don't want an app that judges them at the same time.

New proposals by the SEC have shaken the investor community, threatening the ability of smaller shareholders to file resolutions and potentially preventing ESG issues from being heard.

The US private label RMBS market is set to surge if Fannie and Freddie stop guaranteeing higher debt-to-income mortgages in 2021, but eager investors should approach the sector with care.

Crowdfunding platform Kiva is an example to everyone in finance who wants to make systemic impact.

Thoughts of a possible Democrat victory in 2020 are already giving some concern to investors.

Corporates often perceive options as an expensive means of hedging FX risk compared with forwards, but a number of market developments have increased their attractiveness as a tool for reducing currency exposure.

The ridesharing company’s foray into financial services is a questionable decision given the company’s dismal financial results.

The political and regulatory backlash has driven leading payments companies out of the Libra association, but a new version of the revolutionary stablecoin may yet appear.

The desire to bring secondary-market trading to illiquid private equity is growing.

The failure of the We Company IPO and the poor performance of Uber and Lyft suggest that investment banks have lost their ability to price IPOs. But it also raises deeper questions. Were the elevated paper valuations of private companies a fantasy of wealth creation that could never be realized? Is the new private equity capital market, which seemed to be maturing into institutional-grade infrastructure in the last 18 months, broken?

While the IMF highlights mispriced corporate debt as a systemic danger, so too is misvalued unlisted equity.

The SoFi co-founder’s second act involves eliminating ‘rent seekers’ from the capital markets. Securitizing blockchain-originated loans will go some way towards demonstrating if it can be done.

A mixed third-quarter earnings result showed how Goldman Sachs’ investments in new ventures are dragging on returns, but CEO David Solomon argues they will pay off over time.

A new approach to going public has so far been tested by only two firms, but the people who did those deals see them as the start of something bigger.

The EMEA treasury director at CBRE says: 'Treasury can be truly transformed by introducing technology.'

The head of channels, analytics and innovation for treasury services and head of blockchain initiatives for corporate and investment banking at JPMorgan says: 'The boundaries between technological innovation and product development are blurring.'

The bank's head of treasury and trade solutions, EMEA, says: 'In transaction banking, we see exponential growth.'

Sustainable finance initiatives are great, but now is a good moment to take stock of the progress on commitments already made.