Fee business lines are often considered more volatile than loan business and characterized by an unfavourable risk–return trade-off. However, using FDIC samples from 2001 to 2016, we find that non-interest income still contributes positively to the performance of US banks—without impairing their solvability. On the one hand, our portfolio analysis suggests that the Big 4 seem to benefit from non-interest income, although their rescue of investment banks might not yet be profitable. We also find that trading, loan sales and securitization add flexibility in bank risk management. On the other hand, our results also suggest that the post-crisis regulation appears detrimental to bank performance.

收费业务通常被认为比贷款业务更不稳定，并且具有不利的风险-收益权衡的特点。但是，使用2001年至2016年的FDIC样本，我们发现非利息收入仍对美国银行的业绩做出了积极贡献，而并未损害它们的可偿还性。一方面，我们的投资组合分析表明，四大巨头似乎受益于非利息收入，尽管他们挽救投资银行可能仍未实现盈利。我们还发现，交易，贷款销售和证券化为银行风险管理增加了灵活性。另一方面，我们的结果还表明，危机后的监管似乎不利于银行的绩效。