TD Ameritrade (AMTD) announced on Tuesday morning its earnings for the quarter ended June 30 rose 21% from a year ago — reaching net income of $190 million, or $0.34 per share, meeting analysts' projections.
Net revenues for this quarter exceeded analyst expectations at $763 million, up 5% year over year, and 56% of which were asset-based. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had projected earnings of 34 cents a share and revenue of $759 million.
The brokerage firm saw a decrease in average client trades per day; the activity rate declined 6.5% to 401,000 in the most-recent quarter, down from 491,000 in the prior quarter but up from year-ago daily trades of 399,000.
"Coming off our best trading quarter ending in March, this quarter went a little south," said Bill Gerber, executive vice president and chief financial officer, during a conference call.
He added that while trading had pulled back from the last quarter, this most-recent quarter had delivered the best net new asset quarter in recent history.
Net new assets for the company's fiscal second quarter increased to $13.4 billion from the first quarter, $12.2 billion, and 2013′s Q2 net new assets of $10.8 billion.
Overall client assets were $650 billion as of June 30, rising 5% in this quarter from $617 billion at the start of the period.
Commissions and transaction fees for the most recent period totaled $317 million vs. $374 million in the earlier quarter and $321 million a year earlier. Investment-product fees rose 22% from last year to $79 million.