Brokerage Stocks Reignite Wall Street Tug-of-War

Salomon Smith Barney's Guy Moszkowski is the latest to join a growing queue of analysts saying 2002 won't be as good for the brokerage companies as originally thought. But so far the market is paying little heed.

Moszkowski on Friday trimmed estimates for Bear Stearns (BSC Quote), Goldman Sachs (GS Quote), Lehman Brothers (LEH Quote), Merrill Lynch (MER Quote) and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter (MWD Quote). He downgraded his ratings on Bear and Goldman to neutral from outperform, and dropped Lehman, Merrill and Morgan Stanley to outperform from strong buy. (Solly has done underwriting for all those brokers, save Merrill.)

Last week, Credit Suisse First Boston's Joan Solotar, who has been among the more cautious analysts on brokerage earnings, took her earnings estimates down some more for Goldman and Lehman. (She raised estimates for Bear and Merrill, but remains well below the consensus on those names.) Robertson Stephens' Justin Hughes pulled in his 2002 estimates for the brokers, as did ABN Amro's Robert Napoli. ...