Morgan Stanley reports loss of $91m

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US Wall Street bank Morgan Stanley has reported a surprise loss for the third quarter of the year.

Net losses totalled $91m (£57.8m) for the three months to September, the bank said, thanks in part to a $229m write-down of its stake in an Atlantic City casino company.

But even without the write-down, tough market conditions still hit profits.

Earnings from "continuing operations" totalled $313m - down 67% compared with the same time last year.

Revenues were also down 20%, with the bank blaming weak trading volumes and and slowdown in the bond market.

The massive writedown related to Revel Entertainment Group, a hotel and casino operator that the bank is planning to sell.

But despite those problems, Morgan Stanley's chief executive James Gorman said the performance of the bank, which had seen it fall behind its profitable rival Goldman Sachs, had not be satisfactory.

"Our results in aggregate clearly do not reflect the true potential of Morgan Stanley's global client franchise and I am not satisfied with our overall performance," he said.