< The 2014 All-America Research Team

Total Appearances: 6

Analyst Debut: 2009J.P. Morgan’s Steven Alexopoulos seizes first place on this list, as he has done every year since 2011, in part because he “knows the ins and outs of the companies better than anyone else on the Street,” one money manager asserts. Fundamentals for U.S. midcap banks continue to take a back seat to the macroeconomic backdrop, advises Alexopoulos, especially the outlook and timing for normalization of interest rates. “With the primary business for midcap banks being making loans and taking deposits — and [managing] the spread earned between the two,” he says, “the slope of the yield curve as well as an expected hike in short-term rates are the key factors that we believe should drive stock performance in the back half of 2014 and into 2015.” To that end, he is positive on the sector, citing more attractive valuations and projections for a steeper yield curve from the third quarter into next year. These shifts could also transform current net interest margin pressure into net expansion and propel improved borrowing trends, explains Alexopoulos, 43. Regional operators that he deems likely to reap the rewards of this scenario — and that are trading in line with the broader group on a 2015 estimated-price-earnings basis — include New York–based Signature Bank, the most efficient bank in his coverage universe, with 34 percent annualized loan growth and a return on tangible equity that bests its peers; and Santa Clara, California’s SVB Financial Group, a beneficiary of the significant growth of new businesses in the Silicon Valley area that also serves as a private banker for many of its commercial clients. Alexopoulos “is the best banks analyst out there,” sums up another admirer.