Stifel Financial

Stifel Financial reported solid second-quarter results, with $1.45 billion in quarterly revenue representing 13% annual growth, while $1.42 in adjusted EPS was up 25% from the year-ago period. Shares traded up modestly in early July 22 trading.

Why it matters: Very little changes regarding our long-term outlook for Stifel, which we view as a reasonably competitive mid-market bank and a very profitable but subscale wealth manager. Regarding quarterly results, we had expected better performance in lucrative advisory services, where the firm's market share fell to 1.38% from 1.75% a quarter ago, by our math, driving weaker results than we had expected in the segment and overall. On a consolidated basis, revenue and adjusted EPS came in about 3% and 11% below our respective estimates, although much of the latter can be attributed to tax effects. Investment banking is a lumpy business, so investors shouldn't read too much into any one quarter of out- or underperformance. Still, we've lowered our near-term market share outlook for Stifel, given our expected skew toward larger deals in both advisory and capital raising over the midterm, where the bank is at a comparative disadvantage to bulge-bracket competitors.

The bottom line: After digesting results and recalibrating our cost of capital assumptions, we've lowered our fair value estimate for narrow-moat Stifel Financial to $81 from $84, which corresponds with a 13.4 times forward price/earnings multiple. Shares look fairly priced.

Long view: With investment banking and trading revenues hovering around peak cyclical levels, our 10-year outlook calls for a 4.0%, 5.5%, and 7.1% compound annual growth rate in net revenue, operating income, and diluted EPS for Stifel, respectively. This places its long-term goals for $1 trillion in client assets and $10 billion in annual revenue out of reach over our 10-year forecast, although not unachievable in the very long term.

We maintain an $81 fair value estimate for Stifel, which corresponds to a 13.4 times 2026 price/earnings multiple. We use a 9.6% cost of capital in our valuation.

Consistent with other wealth management and investment banking firms, we view the key drivers of Stifel's valuation as growth in client assets, segment and firmwide compensation ratios, net interest income, and investment banking industrywide growth and company market share.

With a relatively constructive outlook on capital markets, we expect the firm to increase net client assets by a healthy 5.6% annually.

As the firm continues to expand its balance sheet, we expect similar growth in net interest income (5.0%), with asset growth helping offset 12 basis points of projected net interest margin compression between 2025 and 2035, with forecast NIMs equilibrating at 2.94%.

In investment banking, we're relatively optimistic regarding industry growth. We forecast geometric mean annual growth of 1.6% over the next decade, a bit behind the 3.2% figure of the prior decade, largely attributable to base effects (that is, 2025 was a very solid year in investment banking). Here, we expect Stifel to modestly grow its market share, with roughly 1.8% of global advisory revenue and a bit shy of 1.1% of global underwriting. Combined with our tepid outlook on industrywide trading revenue growth, we project a 3.7% 10-year compound annual growth rate in segment revenue, with the firm achieving management's 20% or better long-term segment margin target following its European equity trading exit.

We expect a long-term compensation ratio of roughly 57.4%, better than the 59% average firmwide compensation ratio over the trailing five years. Altogether, this results in a 10-year compound annual growth rate of 4.0% for revenue, 5.5% for adjusted operating profit, and 7.1% in adjusted EPS for Stifel.

We believe Stifel Financial has carved out a narrow economic moat through switching costs in its global wealth management segment, and we expect the diversified financial services firm to continue earning excess returns over the coming decade. Our view is corroborated by 22% average adjusted returns on invested capital over the past decade, including a challenging stretch in the mid-2010s during which the firm integrated its largest acquisition—Keefe, Bruyette & Woods—navigated declines in investment banking and trading revenue industrywide, and hadn’t yet built out the revenue-stabilizing net interest income stream that is Stifel Bancorp.

Stifel has evolved significantly under the guidance of CEO and Chair Ronald Kruszewski, who has guided the ship since 1997. During that period, Stifel acquired and integrated Legg Mason Capital Markets, First Service Financial (which would become Stifel Bank & Trust), UBS’ American wealth management branches, Thomas Wiesel Partners, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, and Business Bancshares (now wrapped into Stifel Bancorp with Stifel Bank & Trust), among roughly 40 total acquisitions over just the past 20 years. The firm has managed to integrate those acquisitions largely seamlessly, building out proficiencies in wealth management, lending, investment banking, and institutional trading that it had lacked beforehand. Today, we view the firm as an able midmarket investment bank and well-managed, if small, wealth manager capable of providing a suite of services for the vast majority of its clients that is at least competitive with those furnished by its much larger peers.

As we see it, the firm’s global wealth management business, and by extension, Stifel Bancorp, which is funded by wealth management sweep deposits, are the heart of the firm’s moat, constituting two-thirds of companywide revenue and 77% of its operating income in 2025. In this segment, we suspect that Stifel benefits from the same favorable dynamics as its industry peers, with advisors reluctant to leave the firm given significant switching costs: lapsed client relationships during a transition and retraining costs. While the firm doesn’t disclose advisor retention data, average tenure industrywide is 10.8 years (Cerulli), and Stifel’s 0.3% annual growth in advisor headcount between 2016-24 (when last disclosed) aligns with industry average growth rates over that period (McKinsey), implying similar retention. Despite operating at a significantly smaller scale than peers, with just $552 billion in client assets at the end of 2025, Stifel has generated strong mid-30% segment margins, allowing it to compete well for financial advisors in motion—that is, advisors changing firms.

Qualitatively, the firm’s wealth management offering can match most of its midscale peers. Stifel is quietly the seventh-largest wealth management firm by advisors in the employee channel (among public banking competitors) and can provide clients and advisors with a competitive assortment of private investment opportunities, advisory and underwriting services through its investment bank, and securities-based, margin, mortgage, and commercial loans through Stifel Bancorp. Monetization among fee-based accounts is also quite good; we estimate that roughly 40% of the firm’s asset management products are distributed to and held by Stifel wealth management clients, adding another largely incremental stream of fee income. The combination of Stifel’s smaller scale, average net recruiting success, and generally less productive advisors (on average) renders a wide moat segment rating inappropriate.

Across the remainder of the business, the investment banking and trading segment accounted for roughly a third of revenue and 23% of operating profit in 2025. We don’t believe that it warrants an economic moat on a stand-alone basis. Stifel certainly has pockets of strength, such as financial services, where KBW is involved in 70% of announced bank and thrift M&A transactions, and in technology following the acquisition of Thomas Wiesel Partners. It consistently ranks at the top of league tables in municipal underwriting, with roughly 15% market share. However, segment returns remain weak, and we struggle to envision the investment bank meaningfully outearning its cost of capital. The firm has averaged 14.8% segment operating margins over the past half-decade, compared with 30% at Morgan Stanley and 43% at Goldman Sachs, both of which earn mid- to high-teens returns on equity through the cycle.

We view Stifel Bancorp as more of an ecosystem service provider than a stand-alone segment and don’t have the data (namely, operating expenses) to evaluate it against our bank moat framework. Still, net interest margins are in line with, or slightly better than, most regional banks in our coverage at 3.08% in 2025, and the bank’s high skew toward variable-interest lending results in only modest interest rate sensitivity. We think Stifel Bancorp provides a valuable service to middle-market investment banking clients, helps increase switching costs for wealth management clients who use its lending services, and provides an attractive and relatively durable stream of largely incremental income for the consolidated firm with a reasonable risk profile.

Looking at the business holistically, we’re impressed by what Stifel has done with its roll-up strategy, building a competitive wealth management and midmarket investment banking franchise. Considering the economics of those businesses and the qualitative moatworthiness of each, we believe that the firm’s wealth management segment warrants a narrow economic moat, built around switching costs on the financial advisor side, but we struggle to get comfortable with a wide-moat horizon for excess returns, given stout competition, challenges with net recruitment, unfavorable channel positioning, and a generally less productive advisor base than larger peers.

Stifel's diversified investment banking model and mid-market exposure could position the company to outperform during a surge in financial sponsor activity.

With a competitive investment bank and brokerage to support it, Stifel's small wealth management business arguably has all the tools it needs to compete for breakaway wirehouse financial advisors.

The exit of less profitable operations like Stifel's affiliate advisor business and its European equities trading business could result in significant margin expansion.

Simultaneous declines in risk appetite, asset prices, and short-term interest rates could significantly diminish Stifel's earnings power.

If artificial intelligence were to diminish the value or pricing power of financial advice, firms like Stifel would be significantly exposed.

General trends toward consolidation in financial services could hurt Stifel, which operates a subscale wealth management arm and middle-market investment bank.