Bank of America (BAC) CEO says co. will see USD 1.6-1.8bln in Q3 Investment Banking fees; sales and trading revenue expeced roughly flat Y/Y

Bank of America (BAC) CEO says co. will see USD 1.6-1.8bln in Q3 Investment Banking fees; sales and trading revenue expeced roughly flat Y/Y.

Mid-quarter revenue guidance from a bank CEO ahead of the print is a well-established format at the large US universal banks, typically delivered at an investor conference or similar event, and the two halves of this one behave differently. Investment banking fee guidance of this kind functions as a read-across to the fee pools of the bulge-bracket peer set, since underwriting and advisory pipelines are shared across the street, whereas the sales and trading line is more firm-specific, depending on client mix and how much of the quarter's activity sat in macro products versus equities. A flat year-on-year trading print against a quarter where peers have previously guided to declines or gains sets up the relative-performance comparison at results rather than any absolute signal. The transmission runs through the peer complex first, with the money-centre banks trading off each other's fee and trading colour between the guidance window and the first official prints. Worth watching is whether the guidance is updated before results and how the other large banks frame the same quarter when they report, since divergence between pre-announcement colour and actuals has on past occasions been a source of single-stock rather than sector moves. As company-level commentary, the read is directional for the group, not the tape broadly.