QualityDipStocks / Finance · Brokers & investment banks
Morgan Stanley MS
On dip watch: 19% below its 52-week high.
A quality company trading well above our fair value estimate.
- Fair value est.
- $119.79−35%
- Market Value
- $183.71at the price
- Off 52-wk high
- −19%
- Risk vs market
- Above marketbeta 1.43
5 bullish · 3 bearish See why
Key levels
Every level vs today’s $184.30
- Fair value est.base case$119.79−35.0%
- 52-wk lowlowest close, 1 year$154.37−16.2%
- Market Valueavg paid since Oct 14$183.71−0.3%
- PriceFri Oct 30 close$184.30you are here
- 52-wk highhighest close, 1 year$228.55+24.0%
Fair value estimate
How the range is computed
Financials model (residual income). Same residual-income model as the base: cost of equity 9.5% ±1 point and return on equity 14.0% ±2 points. Bear = 10.5% and 12.0%; bull = 8.5% and 16.0%. A model estimate from public filings, not a forecast of where the price will go.
Price is above even the bull case.
What the price implies To be worth today’s price, MS would need a return on equity of about 20% a year; our estimate uses 14%.
Risk vs market
How risk vs market is measured
One year of daily returns (Oct 30 to Oct 30, 252 sessions). Beta = how much MS moved for each 1% move in the S&P 500 (SPY); 1.0 moves with the market. Volatility is the yearly standard deviation of daily returns. Past behavior, not a forecast.
Swings more than the market, and its own price swings are 2.2× the S&P 500’s.
- Beta vs S&P 500
- 1.43
- Volatility
- 28% vs 13% SPY
- Correlation SPY
- 0.64
- Correlation QQQ
- 0.56
Bull vs bear
Rule-based from the data on this page, strongest first. Not advice.
Top bullish points 5 of 5
GrowthDiluted EPS grew 28% to $10.21 in FY2025.
GrowthSales grew 18% to $78.0B over the last 12 months vs the 12 months before (SEC filings).
ProfitabilityReturn on equity of 17% over the last 12 months, up 6 points in two years.
Cash returnsDividend yield of 2.3% ($6.8B paid over 12 months, 35% of earnings).
QualityPasses all four of our quality checks: cash generation, returns on capital, growth and balance sheet.
Top bearish points 3 of 5
ValuationOur residual-income fair value estimate is $119.79, 35% below the price.
ValuationPrice / book of 2.5×, above the 1.8× median for the 143 Finance companies we cover.
ValuationP/E of 14.8×, above the 13.5× median for the 151 Finance companies we cover.
Who’s talking about it
Notable investors, executives, analysts and public figures on Morgan Stanley in the last 48 hours. Headlines as published, each linked. Their words, not ours.
No notable mentions in the last 48 hours. Checked Nov 1, 9:09 PM ET.
Compare with peers
Closest in size in Brokers & investment banks
All fundamentals
P/E 14.8 · ROE 17% · Sales +18%
Valuation
- P/E
- 14.8×3-yr-end avg 17.1× · Finance median 13.5×
- Price / FCF
- n/acash flow isn't a clean measure for a bank
- FCF yield
- n/acash flow isn't a clean measure for a bank
- EV / EBITDA
- n/anot meaningful for a bank
- Price / sales
- 3.71×
- Price / book
- 2.49×
- Market cap
- $289Bprice × diluted shares
- Enterprise value
- $512B
Growth
- Revenue, 12 months
- $78.0Bnet interest income + noninterest income
- Sales growth, 12 months
- +18.0%vs the 12 months before
- Sales growth, 3 yrs
- +9.6%/yrfrom FY2022
- Diluted EPS, 12 months
- $12.38
- EPS growth, last FY
- +28.4%
- Net income, 12 months
- $19.5B
- Net income growth
- +38%12 months vs before
Profitability
- Gross margin
- n/anot meaningful for a bank
- Operating margin
- n/anot reported in its SEC filings
- Net margin
- 25.0%
- FCF margin
- n/anot reported in its SEC filings
- Return on equity
- 17%
- Return on invested capital
- n/anot meaningful for a bank
Balance sheet
- Cash & short-term inv.
- $160B
- Total debt
- $383B
- Net cash
- n/anot meaningful for a bank
- Debt / equity
- n/adeposits/float make debt/equity not comparable for a bank
- Interest coverage
- n/anot meaningful for a bank
Cash flow & returns
- Free cash flow, 12 months
- n/anot reported in its SEC filings
- FCF growth, 12 months
- n/anot reported in its SEC filings
- Dividend yield
- 2.34%$6.8B paid
- Payout ratio
- 35%
- Buybacks, 12 months
- n/anot reported in its SEC filings
- Share count, 1 year
- −1.5%diluted shares vs a year ago
- Stock-based comp
- $2.1B
Trailing 12 months to Jun 30, 2026; balance sheet at Jun 30, 2026. From Morgan Stanley’s SEC filings. Sparklines show up to six fiscal years. n/a means we don’t hold that number, with the reason. How each is computed.
Valuation details
DCF $119.79 · MV $183.71
Financials model (residual income): book value $78.10 a share on Jun 30, 2026, plus the earnings above a 9.5% cost of equity. ROE 14.0%, the average of 16.5% for the trailing 12 months to Jun 30, 2026 and 11.5% over fiscal 2021–2025, on average common equity; payout 52% of earnings (dividends 32% + net buybacks 19%), so book grows by the retained rest; the return above 9.5% fades halfway toward 9.5% over 10 years, then grows at 3% (terminal value). From the 10-Q filed Aug 4, 2026.
Setup & signals
No setup armed
No setup armed, so there’s no trigger or stop to track yet. We watch it daily for our three reversal signal rules while it sits in a dip.
Momentum & 52-week range
RSI 43 · 5 days +2.7%
The business
FCF $-20.9B · Sales +27%
- Free cash flow, 12 months−$20.9B
- Free-cash-flow yield−7.0%
- Return on equity18%
- Sales growth (latest quarter vs year-ago quarter)+27%
Information only, not investment advice. Fair value estimates and talking points are rule-based model output from public data and can be wrong; stop levels are reference points, not orders. How every number is computed.
Get a text when MS fires a reversal signal
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