Goldman Sachs Heads Into Q3 Earnings in a Bear Market, 22% Below Its July Record

GS shares closed Friday at $895.32, down about 22.4% from their 52-week intraday high of $1,153.99 set in July, leaving the stock in bear-market territory going into its third-quarter report. The decline has been a slide over several weeks rather than a single-day plunge, and it puts unusual weight on Tuesday's results.

Goldman reports before the open on Tuesday, October 13, with consensus at $12.86 a share according to SentiSense earnings data, against $12.25 a year earlier. Management has already set expectations: at a Barclays conference on September 16, CEO David Solomon said equities remained very strong while "FICC has been a little bit softer on a relative basis," and that non-compensation expenses would be about $500 million higher; the shares fell almost 4% that day, according to Reuters. TradingKey's preview frames the quarter around whether equities trading and investment banking can offset that FICC softness and the cost increase.

The comparison base is high: FICC revenue was $4.59 billion in the second quarter, up 32% from a year earlier. Watch FICC and equities trading revenue, the size of the expense increase, investment banking fees and commentary on the deal pipeline, alongside results from JPMorgan, Citigroup and Wells Fargo the same morning.