For the first time since 2018, the Wells Fargo stagecoach is rolling into a new year without the emergency brake engaged.

In June, the Federal Reserve lifted a stringent $1.95 trillion asset cap, imposed in 2018 after a series of scandals that included creating more than a million fake accounts and charging some mortgage and auto borrowers more than they actually owed. Now, early results show the fourth-largest US bank entering 2026 with more than $2 trillion in assets and picking up momentum.

Seventh Heaven

CEO Charles Scharf, who took over in 2019 after two predecessors departed amid a years-long regulatory firestorm, worked judiciously to rebuild confidence with authorities: He told a financial services forum earlier this month that Wells had dedicated $2 billion to $2.5 billion annually toward resolving regulatory issues. With the asset cap lifted, that capital is freed up for deployment elsewhere. Scharf has also reorganized the business and trimmed the bank’s workforce while hiring dozens of senior managers, including JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley veterans at the executive level, in preparation for Wells’ reemergence.

One of Scharf’s most aggressive goals is to make Wells one of the world’s top five investment banks. In 2025, those new hires made significant headway toward getting there: Wells’ investment bankers advised on $436 billion in mergers and acquisitions, good for ninth place among global lenders, according to Dealogic data. Only a year earlier, the bank ranked 17th. Among the major deals on which Wells worked are Netflix’s $72 billion offer to buy Warner Bros. Discovery and Union Pacific’s $85 billion acquisition of rival rail operator Norfolk Southern. The advances don’t end there:

• Days before Christmas, Bloomberg reported that Wells will enter the options clearing market, where banks earn fees by providing capital and settlements for options trading, in 2026. Bank of America and Goldman Sachs currently dominate the growing space
• GATX and Brookfield Infrastructure announced they received the regulatory go-ahead to complete their acquisition of Wells’ rail operating lease portfolio, and expect the deal to close on or around New Year’s Day. Wells Fargo said the portfolio’s book value of $4.4 billion won’t have a material impact on earnings, but it will help the company continue to simplify its focus on core banking operations.

Sizing Up the Competition: Wells Fargo shares climbed about 34% this year as of Monday, better than the iShares S&P US Banks UCITS ETF, which gained 22%. That also bests Bank of America’s 25% and is roughly on par with JPMorgan’s 35%. Looks like the Wells Fargo wagon is a-comin’ down Wall Street.

All that glitters may actually be gold, at least through the end of next year. After that, traditional wisdom still applies.

The precious metal beloved by safe-haven investors and people eager to reinstitute the gold standard has more than doubled in price over the past two years, its best run since the energy crisis of 1979. Forecasts see the rally continuing through December 2026, though one analysis warns that gold’s boom alongside a runup in equities may warrant caution.

Double Trouble

At roughly $4,360 per ounce, the price of spot gold has risen 67% in 2025. The question of its future, the Wall Street consensus says, is not if it will continue climbing in 2026, but by how much. Morgan Stanley forecasts the lustrous metal touching $4,500 by the middle of the year, and JPMorgan is slightly more bullish at $4,600. Goldman Sachs says it may finish 2026 around $4,900, and JPMorgan expects $5,000.

That’s because the factors that have supported gold’s rally have stuck around: There are still geopolitical tensions involving Ukraine and the Middle East, US deficit concerns, a weaker dollar and uncertainty about Federal Reserve policy. Most importantly, central banks are diversifying their reserves away from dollar-denominated assets, creating a crucial floor for demand. In a survey of central banks released by the World Gold Council in June, 95% of respondents said they planned to boost their gold holdings in the next year, while 73% predicted moderate or significantly lower US dollar holdings in global reserves over the next five years.

Not all the analysis is this rosy. See the Bank for International Settlements, the global monetary corporation owned by 63 central banks, including the Federal Reserve:

• A BIS analysis published earlier this month found that 2025 has marked the first time in 50 years that gold and the S&P 500 have exhibited “explosive behaviour” — or rapid, accelerating growth — at the same time. Coupled with concerns about the sustainability of the stock market’s AI-driven rise, the bank cautioned that a double bubble could form.
• BIS researchers found evidence that “retail investor exuberance and appetite for seemingly easy capital gains have spilled over” to gold, whose exchange-traded funds have traded at a premium relative to their net asset value since the start of 2025.

Bullion Bulls: In addition to retail investors who see a smelting-hot opportunity, gold’s rally has been supported by institutional investors who see it as a traditional safe haven. Both have poured into gold-backed ETFs: ETF investors added 222 tons of gold in the third quarter, the largest inflow in years, according to the Gold Council.

For some of the most storied names on Wall Street, the trillion-dollar question is whether the dealmaking bonanza that began in mid-2025 will continue next year. Looks like the odds are in their favor.

After a quiet start to this year, dealmaking picked up as the Trump administration relaxed regulations and interest rates continued to decline. Global mergers and acquisitions ultimately surged 41% year-over-year to $4.8 trillion in 2025 — the second-highest total on record after 2021 — spurred by a record 70 megadeals valued at more than $10 billion each, according to data from Mergermarket.

Leaders of the Pack

JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs proved they’re still the go-to middlemen for many of Wall Street’s major deals. Goldman took the top spot in worldwide M&A advisory rankings, with $1.4 trillion in deals as of Dec. 18, according to data from LSEG, followed by JPMorgan with $1.1 trillion.

Those deals gave both banks a boost during the third-quarter earnings season:

• JPMorgan Chase’s net income of $14.4 billion was up 12% from a year earlier and topped analysts’ expectations. “M&A activity picked up against a supportive backdrop,” CEO Jamie Dimon said in a statement.
• Goldman Sachs also beat estimates when it reported revenues of $15.18 billion, a 20% increase from the year prior. Investment banking fees were 42% higher than in the third quarter of 2024, reflecting a jump in completed mergers and acquisitions.

Those giants aren’t expecting to slow down any time soon.

“Setting aside 2021, next year could be one of the best of the last 10 years because there wasn’t a lot of volatility in volume over the last decade,” Jay Hofmann, co-head of M&A for North America at JPMorgan Chase, told Reuters. “If global M&A volumes are up 15% or 20% next year, it wouldn’t be a surprise to us at all.”

Goldman Chief Financial Officer Denis Coleman recently said the industry may have its second-biggest year in history for announced M&A volume in 2026.

Bronze Medal: Don’t forget the other Morgan. Morgan Stanley closely followed JPMorgan in LSEG’s rankings, with $1 trillion in deals for the year.