Morgan Stanley's quarterly earnings rose as the bank's legal costs fell sharply, outweighing a big drop in revenue from its division that trades bonds, currencies and commodities.
Choppy markets caused by factors ranging from plunging oil prices to political upheaval in Greece, sent investors scurrying last month.
This reduced the trading revenue of US banks including Morgan Stanley's arch rival Goldman Sachs Group.
Morgan Stanley said today that its revenue from trading fixed-income securities, currencies and commodities (FICC) fell 81% to $133m, excluding accounting adjustments.
Revenue from the bank's increasingly important wealth management business rose 2.4% to $3.8 billion as equity markets boomed.
Overall, earnings attributable to common shareholders rose to $920m, or 47 cents per share, in the fourth quarter from $36m, or 2 cents per share, a year earlier.
Legal expenses in the three month period fell to $284m from $1.4 billion.
