US banks look to beat 2015 earnings record

New York

WALL Street banks just eked out their most profitable year since before the financial crisis by slashing budgets. Can they top that?

The sobering answer for many is that they can - if they cut even deeper than they did in 2015, when they reduced costs by 13 per cent and shed more than 20,000 jobs.

The five major US investment banks generated US$70 billion of net income in 2015 by s…