“TD Ameritrade Holding Corp.’s AMTD -0.43% fiscal second-quarter earnings slumped 20% as a decline in fees for handling trades weighed on the online brokerage’s revenue.
Chief Financial Officer Bill Gerber called the operating environment during the quarter “difficult,” noting the e-broker managed to improve its revenue from the previous quarter despite near-zero interest rates and low intraday volatility.
Average daily client trades at Ameritrade totaled roughly 388,000 in the latest period, down from a year earlier, although up from the December quarter.
Rising optimism on the state of the global economy helped draw retail investors back to the market in recent months, boosting trading volume at the major e-brokers.
Ameritrade, which has in recent quarters made strides in gathering new assets, reported Tuesday that it added $10.8 billion in net new assets in the latest period, compared with $11.5 billion a year earlier and $10.2 billion in the previous quarter.
For the quarter ended March 31, the company reported a profit of $136.7 million, or 25 cents a share, compared with a year-earlier profit of $171.7 million, or 30 cents a share.
Net revenue fell 6.3% to $673.1 million. Commissions and transactions fees slumped 14% to $292.1 million.
Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expected earnings of 25 cents a share on revenue of $672 million.”
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