Three Banks Heading Into Earnings With Very Different Setups

Jamie Dimon's bank continues to be the boring-but-brilliant play in US financials. Revenue hit $279.7 billion in fiscal 2025, with net income of $57 billion — a slight decline from $58.5 billion in 2024, but still a number that makes every other bank CEO quietly envious.

At 14.7x trailing earnings and 13.7x forward, JPM is the cheapest of the three on a PE basis. The dividend yield provides a floor, and the $794 billion market capitalisation gives it a liquidity profile that institutional investors can actually move in and out of without moving the price.

The risk here isn't the business — it's the macro. If loan losses accelerate in a tariff-driven slowdown, JPM's credit provisions will eat into that $57 billion bottom line. But this is a bank that stress-tested through 2008 and came out stronger. We've seen JPM navigate three distinct credit cycles in the past 15 years, and each time the market underestimated its resilience.

Goldman is the high-beta play on capital markets activity. After an 89% surge over the past year, the stock isn't cheap anymore — but the setup into earnings is compelling if you believe the M&A cycle is inflecting.

Goldman's revenue of $53.5 billion in 2025 came with net income of $13.5 billion. The operating margin of 33.4% is strong by banking standards but still below the 2021 peak. The analyst consensus target implies further upside, and the recent upgrade of Netflix to Buy suggests Goldman's research franchise is actively generating client engagement.

The question for Goldman isn't whether the quarter will be good — it almost certainly will. The question is whether the advisory pipeline can sustain through a potentially volatile macro environment. If tariff uncertainty freezes cross-border M&A, Goldman's highest-margin business takes the hit first.

BofA sits at the intersection of consumer banking and rate sensitivity. With revenue of $171.8 billion and net income of $27.1 billion in 2025, it's the middle child of the big three — not JPM's fortress, not Goldman's capital markets leverage, but a diversified consumer and commercial franchise.

The Medicare payment rate news is a secondary signal, but it matters for BofA's healthcare lending book. New payment rates affect hospital system profitability, which flows through to credit quality in healthcare-linked commercial real estate. It's the kind of second-order risk that most investors miss.

At current levels, BofA trades at roughly 14x forward earnings with a healthy dividend yield. The stock offers the most rate sensitivity of the three — if the Fed cuts, BofA's net interest margin compresses faster than JPM's, but the mortgage origination volume picks up to offset.