Wells Fargo & Co (NYSE:WFC, ETR:NWT) shares added more than 6% after the bank’s third quarter earnings exceeded Wall Street’s expectations.
Adjusted earnings per share of $1.42 handily beat estimates of $1.28 but were down from $1.48 in the year-ago quarter.
Net income fell from $5.76 billion to $5.11 billion.
Revenue of $20.37 billion was short of the $20.42 billion expected. It was down 2% year-over-year from $20.86 billion.
Net interest income declined significantly from the year-ago quarter, down 11% at $11.7 billion, attributed to higher funding costs amid customer migration to higher-yielding deposit products.
“Our earnings profile is very different than it was five years ago as we have been making strategic investments in many of our businesses and de-emphasizing or selling others,” Wells Fargo CEO Charlie Scharf said in a statement.
“Our revenue sources are more diverse and fee-based revenue grew 16% during the first nine months of the year, largely offsetting net interest income headwinds.”
He noted that the company has increased its Q3 dividend by 14% and repurchased $3.5 billion of common shares during the period, and more than $15 billion in the first nine months of the year, up 60% from a year ago.
Shares of Wells Fargo traded up 6.1% at about $61.