All the big banks have now reported Q3 earnings, so here they are:
![](https://www.motherjones.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/blog_bank_earnings_q3_20181.gif)
These might seem like pretty spectacular results to you, since even the top percentile of ordinary schlubs didn’t see their wages go up more than 5-6 percent in the third quarter. But you’d be wrong. Several big banks were flat or even down on these results. Bank of America, for example, opened Monday at $28.11 and is currently trading at … $28.11.
But if Wall Street isn’t that impressed, the rest of us should be. An average increase in profits of 23 percent seems pretty good, especially with all these banks straining under the cruel yoke of Dodd-Frank rules that practically keep them from opening their doors for business each morning. It’s a miracle they can stay in business at all, let alone continue to increase their earnings by billions of dollars each quarter. So huzzah to America’s big banks. Truly they show what hard work and free market capitalism are all about.