Big Bank CEOs still see a resilient US economy — with some caveats

Big Bank CEOs still see a resilient US economy — with some caveats David Hollerith · Senior Reporter Thu, May 28, 2026 at 3:17 PM GMT+2 3 min read BAC The heads of three of the country’s biggest banks see a US economy still powered by businesses and a remarkably strong American consumer. But they also gave some cautionary notes. The CEOs of JPMorgan Chase ( JPM ), Bank of America ( BAC ), and Wells Fargo ( WFC ) said they still see another strong quarter for their Wall Street and Main Street franchises on Wednesday during Bernstein’s Strategic Decisions Conference in New York.

“Things are still extremely, extremely strong,” Wells Fargo CEO Charles Scharf said. Although consumer sentiment is sitting at a record low, “consumer spend is actually even stronger than it was a couple of weeks ago, a couple of months ago. ” “Oil [prices] being higher for longer,” can change that,” he added, noting that the price of oil is already set to be “higher than people probably initially expected.

” Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan said, “People are spending money, and that’s because, frankly, they’re employed. ” Higher consumer spending so far this month isn’t coming at the expense of more loan delinquencies either, he added. Business clients “say they’re not growing inventories … as much as they might otherwise do if they had more confidence in what the next six months were going to look like,” Scharf noted.

But they are “still financially very, very strong. ” Bank of America Global Research recently lowered its forecast for US economic growth in 2026 to 2. 2%, down from the mid-2% pace it projected at the beginning of the year.

But Moynihan said the growth projection is “reasonably strong” compared to the last “15, 20 years. ” Small and medium-size businesses are “trying to make sure they’re grounded” after the onset of the Iran war and the Supreme Court’s ruling on tariffs this spring. “Still, they’re borrowing a little more,” Moynihan added.

Read more:  How to protect your money during turmoil, stock market volatility Wall Street remains the major growth story for these lending giants, with each CEO saying their banks are poised to deliver sizable revenue increases from trading and dealmaking. The upbeat Wall Street picture comes as all three banks are involved in taking public Elon Musk’s monster rocket company, SpaceX ( SPAX. PVT ).

With potential OpenAI ( OPAI. PVT ) and Anthropic ( ANTH. PVT ) IPOs on the horizon, this could put 2026 at record IPO pace — but the window for that kind of activity can “can close tomorrow,” based on market conditions, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said.

Meanwhile, the less predictable trading divisions continue to churn out higher fees, each of the CEOs acknowledged. Story Continues JPMorgan’s quarterly trading and investment banking revenues are on pace to be up approximately 11% and 10%, respectively, Dimon told analysts, adding that both Wall Street businesses may “be a little better” depending on how the rest of the quarter turns out. JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon speaks during the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, on Jan.

21, 2026. (Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images) · FABRICE COFFRINI via Getty Images “We feel good about the quarter,” Moynihan said, adding that BofA expects to post a 15% increase in trading revenue, while investment banking fees are expected to be “up strong. ” Wells Fargo reported “mid-teens-ish [revenue] growth” across its corporate investment bank last quarter, and a big source of future growth can come from simply selling more of its fee-based investment banking products to smaller commercial customers, Scharf said.

“Part of it is just the state of the world, part of it is the administration, part of it is just there’s more volatility,” Scharf told investors. He added that its corporate investment bank “should be making $1 billion more a year … when you look at what our middle market customers pay the Street, if we were just to get our fair share, not even all of it. ” “Yes, right now, it’s good,” Dimon said of the bank’s Wall Street businesses.

“But it was in ‘72, ‘86, 2000, 2007. ” All four of those boom periods for Wall Street came just ahead of major market shocks. David Hollerith is a senior reporter at Yahoo Finance covering the cryptocurrency and stock markets.

Follow him on X at @DsHollers .