Evercore's second quarter of 2026 is the financial statement of an elite investment bank firing on every cylinder at once. Net revenues reached a record $990.2 million, up 19 percent from $833.8 million a year earlier, and the first half set a record at $2.4 billion, up 56 percent. Advisory fees, the heart of the franchise, rose 11 percent to $775.6 million in the quarter and 61 percent year to date, underwriting fees tripled to $97.1 million, and the firm advised on some of the largest announced transactions of the period, including Arcosa's $8.5 billion sale to CRH and Iridium Communications' $8.0 billion sale to Rocket Lab. The stock trades at $290.11, about 25 percent below its 52-week high of $388.71, with a market capitalization of roughly $11.2 billion, a trailing price-to-earnings ratio of 16.4x, a forward multiple of 12.8x, and a dividend yield of 1.2 percent.
The disconnect is the story. Evercore is delivering record results while its stock trades well off its high, and the valuation multiples are those of an ordinary financial company rather than a franchise at peak performance. The firm returned $822.9 million to shareholders in the first half through dividends and buybacks, repurchasing 2.3 million shares at an average price of $324.60, which is above where the stock trades now. Management, in other words, has been buying its own stock at prices higher than the current market quote, which is the clearest possible signal of internal confidence in the durability of the results.
The business is split into two segments: Investment Banking and Equities, which earns advisory, underwriting, and commissions revenue, and Investment Management, which runs roughly $16.2 billion in wealth management assets, up 12 percent. The second quarter saw record revenues in North America strategic advisory, the private funds group, and the equities business, while underwriting and wealth management each posted their best quarter on record. The number of fee-generating advisory and underwriting transactions rose 21 percent to 296 in the quarter, and 28 percent year to date to 494, which is the volume engine behind the revenue records.
The risk is that investment banking is a cyclical business, and the current boom in announced deal activity can fade as fast as it arrived. The compensation ratio, the share of revenue paid to bankers, fell to 64.8 percent from 65.8 percent, which is the margin engine of the current earnings beat, and non-compensation expenses rose 34 percent, which is the cost side of running a larger business. The investment question is whether the deal environment holds long enough for the market to give Evercore credit for what it is earning, and at 12.8 times forward earnings with record volumes and an aggressive buyback, the entry point is more favorable than the stock price alone suggests.