By Anil D'Silva and Richa Naidu
(Reuters) - Morgan Stanley
The results capped a robust quarter for big U.S. banks - Goldman Sachs Group Inc
"Overall it has been a pretty good quarter for the universal banks. They continue to show expense discipline and revenue are going to hang in there better than many expected," Sandler O'Neill analyst Jeffery Harte said.
Morgan Stanley CEO James Gorman has been focusing on equities trading and wealth management as profit drivers for the sixth-largest U.S. bank by assets as stricter regulations and capital requirements make its more difficult to trade bonds.
On an adjusted basis, revenue from the bank's equities trading business jumped 27 percent to $2.27 billion, beating arch rival Goldman, which reported revenue of $2 billion. Goldman had come out on top in the two preceding quarters.
Strength in equities trading was driven by derivatives and prime brokerage, which offers services to hedge funds and other professional investors, Chief Financial Officer Jonathan Pruzan said on a conference call.
Pruzan, who replaced Ruth Porat in March after she left for a similar role at Google Inc
Moody's said the upgrade - the only two-notch increase among the 13 global banks it assessed - was based on the bank's increased business diversification, prospects for improved profitability and lower earnings volatility.
On an adjusted basis, Morgan Stanley's revenue from trading fixed-income, currency and commodities rose 25 percent to $1.27 billion in the three months ended June 30. [IDn:nBw1FshNLa]
Fixed-income trading dragged on the earnings of other big Wall Street banks during the quarter as concerns ranging from the Greek debt crisis to the timing of a long-awaited U.S. interest rate hike kept traders on the sidelines.
Morgan Stanley's institutional securities business - which includes both bond and equity trading - accounted for 52.2 percent of overall revenue in quarter, up from 49 percent a year earlier.
Revenue from equities trading accounted for about 24 percent of total adjusted revenue in the latest quarter, while bond trading accounted for about 13 percent.
In 2006, bond trading accounted for more than 28 percent of revenue while equities trading accounted for about 19 percent.
Morgan Stanley's shares were up 0.4 percent in early trading following what Nomura Securities International analyst Steven Chubak described as "an impressive set" of results.
WEALTH MANAGEMENT MARGIN RISES
The bank's wealth management business achieved a pretax margin of 23 percent, up from 22 percent in the first quarter and 21 percent in the year-earlier quarter. Gorman has set a target of 22-25 percent for the business this year.
Adjusted net revenue rose 12.2 percent to $9.56 billion, with wealth management net revenue increasing 4.7 percent to $3.88 billion.
Morgan Stanley said net income fell to $1.67 billion, or 85 cents per share, from $1.82 billion, or 92 cents per share, a year earlier.
On an adjusted basis, the bank earned 79 cents per share - beating the average analyst estimate by 5 cents, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Still, the bank's adjusted average return-on-equity of 9.1 percent remained below the 10 percent minimum set by Gorman.
Revenue from investment banking, which includes advising on takeovers and underwriting equity and bond issues, fell 1 percent to $1.61 billion.
Morgan Stanley ranked second globally after Goldman Sachs in advising on deals in the first half of 2015, according to Thomson Reuters data.
The five big Wall Street banks - excluding Wells Fargo Corp
(Additional reporting by Olivia Oran and Sudarshan Varadhan; Editing by Ted Kerr)
