James Gorman, chief executive officer of Morgan Stanley
Michael Nagle/Bloomberg
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More consolidation and more reliance on fees. Those two Wall Street trends took the spotlight this past Thursday when
Morgan Stanley
said that it would pay $7 billion for
Eaton Vance.
The deal, coming on the heels of the Wall Street giant’s purchase of discount broker E*Trade, marks another step in its retreat from its somewhat swashbuckling pre-financial-crisis persona, when it made much of its money from risky trading. And it fits in with a wave of consolidation reshaping the money-management industry.
Combined, Morgan Stanley (ticker: MS) and Eaton Vance (EV) would generate $26 billion in annual pro forma net revenue, much of it from steady fee income for overseeing $1.2 trillion in assets and providing associated services.
Eaton Vance has a strong lineup of mutual funds offered under its own name, many focused on fixed income.