Bank of America 2014 Annual Report Download - page 2

To our shareholders,
Last year was again challenging for financial institutions.
Sustained low interest rates continued to pressure net interest
margins. Economic and geopolitical uncertainties continued to
surface, causing markets, companies, investors and consumers
to respond to volatility almost at a moment’s notice. And, our
industry continued to face increasing demands for higher
capital and liquidity, as well as changes to our business models.
We started to address many of these issues five years ago — we
trimmed hundreds of billions of dollars in assets from our balance
sheet, eliminated dozens of non-core businesses, and increased
our capital and liquidity so we could survive and operate in
whatever crisis may arise. We also made tremendous progress
on right-sizing our cost base for the revenue environment and
managed risk well. Also, we settled most of the remaining issues
related to the financial crisis, particularly in the mortgage space.
Several issues continue to dominate the discussion around our
industry, including “too big to fail,” questions about resolution
plans, and new regulatory requirements for capital and liquidity.
In addition, the need for state-of-the-art cybersecurity and
other technologies means we must continue to invest in core
security and innovation for our customers and our teammates.
Living our purpose
Despite these forces, if we stick to our core business strategies
of serving our customers and clients, and providing an engine
to help the real economy grow, then we will fulfill our purpose
of helping our clients and customers live their financial lives by
connecting and simplifying a complex world.
That is what we have been doing for the past several years,
and we will continue to do so in the future. With this focus has
come core high-quality and low-risk growth, a restoration of
our brand, and shared success with our customers and clients.
We also are seeing renewed energy in the communities in which
we live and work.
Maintaining and sharpening this focus takes tremendous
discipline. I thank our board of directors, our management
team, and our teammates around the globe for their hard work
on behalf of our clients, customers and shareholders. Together
with risk and operational focus, our ability to stay disciplined
will serve us well into the future.
So how did we do in 2014?
We serve three groups of customers
As we have discussed many times, we serve people (individuals),
companies (large and small) and institutional investors.
In the U.S. we serve all three customer groups, and outside the
U.S., we have simplified and reduced our risk profile by focusing
primarily on larger companies and institutional investors.
Brian T. Moynihan
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Thank you for investing in our company. During 2014, your investment increased in
value by 15 percent. This follows gains of 34 percent in 2013 and 109 percent in 2012.
Our goal is to continue to deliver long-term value to you, our shareholders, as we
execute our strategy to serve our customers and clients. We still have lots of work
ahead of us to get it back to a normalized level, but we are making good progress.