Welcome to Seeking Alpha's Wall Street Lunch, our afternoon update on today's market action news and analysis.

Good afternoon. Today is Friday, Januaryth and I'm your host Kim Khan.

Our top story so far. Welcome to earning season. A raft of results from

major banks started things in earnest this morning. The market liked what it heard from

J.P. Morgan Chase and City, but was less impressed with numbers from Wells Fargo

and Bank of America. J.P. Morgan, the country's largest bank, said it expects 2024 net interest income, excluding

its markets business, to stay at about the same level as it was in 2023 as it expects loan growth

to partly offset lower interest rates.

The bank expects full year net interest income of about $90 billion or $88 billion excluding

markets compared with the 86.4 billion forecasts compiled by visible

Alpha consensus and 89.3 billion in 2023. City Group said it expects

2024 revenue to increase to about 80 to 81 billion from 78.5 billion in 2023,

driven by gains in Treasury and Trade Solutions, security services,

a rebound in investment banking and wealth, and lower partner payments in retail services.

CEO Jane Fraser says,

Given how far we are down the path of our simplification in divestitures,

2024 will be a turning point as we'll be able to completely focus on the performance

of our five businesses and our transformation.

Wells Fargo's bottom line was impacted by the FDIC's special assessment on big banks to replenish its insurance fund after the regional bank turbulence last March.

A charge for planned staff cuts also hit profit.

For 2024, the bank said net interest income could be about 7 to 9% lower than 2023's 52.4 billion level on lower interest rates and expected decline in average loans

and further attrition in consumer banking and lending deposits. Bank of America

...