New York State Comptroller Says Wall Street Profits Could Top $90 Billion by the End of the Year

Fearless Girl must be proud. 

In the face of market volatility, geopolitical risk, worries of AI disruption, tariffs and more, Wall Street has refused to be rattled. Instead, it generated $45.9 billion in the first half of the year, according to a report released by New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli Tuesday. That’s up 51.3% from the same period in 2025 and far exceeds New York City’s $45.3 billion forecast for the entire year. If the pace continues, profits could surpass $90 billion by the end of the year, which, even adjusting for inflation, would top 2009 levels. 

Animal Spirits Return?  

While nearly all revenue lines increased, underwriting activities, account supervision and commissions were particularly strong (commodities trading was the exception, likely due to oil’s soaring prices). Global mergers and acquisitions activity topped any other half-year period on record at $2.8 trillion, and Wall Street employees benefited, too: Average salaries including bonuses for New York City’s securities industry climbed 11.1% to $561,770 in 2025. DiNapoli said he now expects the 2026 bonus pool to increase, instead of falling 20% as the city had projected. 

The enthusiasm and spending around AI have given the stock market a massive boost of late, with the S&P 500 hitting a new record on Tuesday, and excitement about massive upcoming IPOs from companies like Anthropic and OpenAI is likely to keep M&A activity strong. None of which is to say there isn’t plenty of risk to go around: 

• The global bond market is still facing a sell-off, with the 10-year US Treasury yield recently hitting its highest level since 2002. Inflation is still well above the Fed’s target, and the markets are expecting at least one more interest rate hike at the end of the year. 
• The equities rally may also be a product of algorithms rather than animal spirits, with a small number of megacap companies doing much of the work. The top 10 constituents of the S&P 500 account for 39% of the index. 

City That Never Sleeps on Tax Collection: DiNapoli’s report was a reminder of just how much those eight blocks in the Financial District contribute to New York’s wallet. Wall Street generated approximately $26.3 billion in tax revenue for the state in the 2025-26 fiscal year, which was a 28.5% boost from the year before and about 20.8% of all the state’s tax collections. As for the Big Apple, it pocketed $7.8 billion in tax revenue from the securities industry in fiscal year 2026. That’s roughly 9% of the city’s total tax collections.