Investment banking boosts profits: JPMorgan Chase & Co. reported a 67% jump in first-quarter earnings today on solid growth in investment banking fees and a drop in losses from credit cards. The bank’s mortgage business continued to be weak. The New York bank earned $5.6 billion, or $1.28 per share, compared with $3.3 billion, or 74 cents a share, in the same period last year. The profits at JPMorgan, the first bank to report earnings, were way ahead of the $1.15 per share analysts surveyed by FactSet were expecting. Revenue fell to $25.2 billion from $27.7 billion in the same period last year. JPMorgan is the nation’s second-largest bank after Bank of America Corp., as measured by assets. The slump in real estate continued to weigh heavily on JPMorgan’s results. The bank increased its provision for mortgage-related losses by $1.1 billion.
Digital video, social media key for record spending: U.S. Internet advertising revenue hit a record $26 billion in 2010. A PricewaterhouseCoopers report commissioned by the Interactive Advertising Bureau says that last year’s ad revenue grew 15% from 2009. The previous record was in 2008, when full-year revenue hit $23.4 billion. The report, released today, says fourth-quarter advertising revenue also hit a record, $7.4 billion; that’s up 16% from the fourth quarter of 2009. By far the most popular ad format was search, which represented 46%, or $12 billion, of the year’s total revenue, a 12% rise from a year earlier. PricewaterhouseCoopers partner David Silverman says an increase in time spent online, boosted by the popularity of digital videos and social media, has helped fuel the ongoing advertising growth.
