差不多一年前这个时候，詹姆斯•戈尔曼正坐在摩根士丹利的交易室椅子上，戴着夹式麦克风，眼睛盯着摄像机。对于这位摩根士丹利（Morgan Stanley）CEO而言，这一天是Facebook IPO审判日。

    坐在他身旁的是CNBC电视频道主持人玛丽亚•巴蒂罗姆。这宗采访是几个星期前戈尔曼就答应下的，当时Facebook的IPO看起来还是前景一片大好，到头来却让人大跌眼镜。戈尔曼最终还是决定继续接受采访。但这个决定可能一开始就错了。灯光有问题。戈尔曼看起来并不自在。他毫无歉意，斗志旺盛。戈尔曼称那些在Facebook IPO中亏钱的个人投资者为“幼稚”。绝口不提摩根士丹利和Facebook在这宗IPO中大捞了一笔。

    困扰这位CEO还不只是Facebook。戈尔曼还面临着公司信用评级可能下调、与花旗集团（Citigroup）就美邦（Smith Barney）收购价格的争斗升级、以及经纪人不满加剧等挑战。很多观察人士曾经断言，用不了几个月，戈尔曼就会被扫地出门。

    事实并非如此。今年5月18日是Facebook IPO一周年。戈尔曼仍稳坐摩根士丹利头把交椅，而且现在看起来比过去任何时候都更有希望引领公司扭转局面。摩根士丹利股价在过去一年大涨81%，最近报价为25美元。

    很多顶级投资者近来都买入了该股，包括Wellington Management和T. Rowe Price。在上周一召开的年度股东大会上，摩根士丹利的高管薪酬计划和董事会重选方案几乎未遇任何阻力。与摩根大通（JPMorgan Chase）不同，在摩根士丹利从未有过拆分CEO与董事长职位的讨论。去年9月曾预测戈尔曼可能离职的里昂证券（CLSA）银行业分析师迈克•马尤，本周将摩根士丹利的估值上调至36美元，主要就是考虑到戈尔曼的利润增长计划。

    “他在美邦的收购和执行过程中表现出色，信用评级问题很快得到了解决，”前摩根士丹利CEO麦晋桁（John Mack）表示，“我给他打高分，这些市场不容易驾驭。”

    戈尔曼一年前面临的每个大问题几乎都已按摩根士丹利的方式解决了。

    戈尔曼说服穆迪（Moody's）将摩根士丹利的债券评级下调两档，而不是预计的3档，为公司节约了近30亿美元。而且，戈尔曼也迫使公司的银行家和交易员抛出高风险资产。结果是，现在投资者对于摩根士丹利的债券比一年前下调评级前更感到安心。如今，1,000万美元的摩根士丹利债券5年保费只需119,000美元，大大低于1年前的451,650美元。

    Nearly a year ago, James Gorman sat in a chair on his firm's trading floor, clipped on a microphone and stared into a camera. For Morgan Stanley's CEO, it was Facebook judgment day.

    Next to him was CNBC's Maria Bartiromo. Gorman had agreed to the interview weeks before, back when the Facebook IPO still looked like it was going to be blockbuster, not the bust it turned out to be. But Gorman decided to go ahead with the interview anyway. From the moment it started, though, it was apparent he shouldn't have. The lighting was bad. Gorman looked uncomfortable. He was unapologetic and combative. Gorman called individual investors who had lost money on the IPO "naive." Never mind the fact that Morgan Stanley and Facebook (FB) had made a killing on the deal.

    But it wasn't just the fallout from Facebook that was dogging the CEO. Gorman was also facing a looming credit downgrade, an increasingly bitter fight with Citigroup (C) over the price of his Smith Barney acquisition and a growing revolt among the brokers that he was now being bullied into paying up for. A number of observers predicted Gorman would be out within a few months.

    But that's not what happened. May 18 will be the one-year anniversary of the Facebook IPO. Gorman still holds the top job at Morgan Stanley (MS) and now looks closer than ever to pulling off the turnaround many thought would allude him. Morgan Stanley's shares are up 81% in the past year to a recent $25.

    A number of top investors have been buying shares recently, including Wellington Management and T. Rowe Price (TROW). At its annual meeting on Monday, Morgan Stanley faced little opposition to its executive compensation plan, or the reelection of its board. And unlike at JPMorgan Chase (JPM), there has been no talk of splitting the CEO and chairman position. CLSA bank analyst Mike Mayo, who back in September said Gorman was likely to go, this week upped his estimate for the shares to $36 largely on Gorman's plan to boost the company's profits.

    "He's been brilliant on the acquisition and execution of Smith Barney, and the credit rating issue was solved quickly," says John Mack, who was the prior CEO of Morgan Stanley. "I give him high marks, and these are not easy markets to navigate."

    Nearly every big issue facing Gorman a year ago has gone Morgan Stanley's way.

    Gorman convinced Moody's to downgrade the company's debt rating two notches rather than an expected three, saving the bank nearly $3 billion. And Gorman has forced the firm's bankers and traders to sell off risky assets. The result is that investors are more comfortable with Morgan Stanley's debt than they were a year ago before the downgrade. It now costs $119,000 to insure $10 million of Morgan Stanley debt for five years. That's down from $451,650 a year ago.

    对美邦进行估值的第三方咨询公司Perella Weinberg为戈尔曼提供了又一项战果，这家咨询公司基本与摩根士丹利站在一边，将收购交易价格缩减多达85亿美元。另外，争取新雇员的工作虽然尚未完成，美邦经纪人并未出现大幅流失。

    Facebook IPO让摩根士丹利自负的科技团队栽了个大跟头。摩根士丹利支付的相关罚款达到了500万美元。根据Dealogic的数据，摩根士丹利在2012年科技股IPO主承销商中排名第六。在Facebook IPO之前一年，该公司排名第一。但若论美国投行的科技类交易费用收入（包括兼并购和非IPO股票发行），摩根士丹利仍名列第一。

    麦晋桁称，将Facebook IPO失败归咎于戈尔曼或摩根士丹利其他高管是不公平的。以38美元发行的Fackbook股价一年后仍仅为26美元，“当时我们很多人都说不要定这样高的价格，”麦晋桁表示，“但Facebook的问题是严重超额认购。”

    麦晋桁表示，Facebook想要出售股票。因此，摩根士丹利的银行家们觉得，如果有人打算买下这些额外的股票，不妨由他们来。”即便如此，麦晋桁认为，是纳斯达克（Nasdaq）的技术故障最终搞砸了这宗IPO，造成IPO当天交易推迟，整天问题不断。

    戈尔曼拒绝对本文置评。摩根士丹利继去年亏损，而今年一季度盈利近10亿美元后，戈尔曼表示，公司的许多大麻烦已经过去了。

    但是，戈尔曼打出“任务完成”的标语还为时尚早。一季度业绩得到改善，但仍低于分析师的预期。曾经买进760万股摩根士丹利股票、断言股价将翻番的对冲基金经理丹•勒布最近在监管文件中披露，其所在公司Third Point已在一季度抛出了全部摩根士丹利股票。勒布拒绝发表评论。摩根士丹利的权益回报率最近升至了7.6%，但仍远远低于金融危机前的水平。而且，摩根士丹利债券交易业务显著落后于长期竞争对手高盛（Goldman Sachs）等。

    Perella Weinberg, the third-party adviser brought into value Smith Barney, handed another victory to Gorman, mostly siding with Morgan Stanley, cutting the price of the deal by as much as $8.5 billion. And, while the job's not done winning over his new employees, there's been no major exodus of Smith Barney brokers.

    The Facebook IPO has taken Morgan Stanley's vaunted technology team down a notch. Morgan Stanley was forced to pay a $5 million fine related to the deal. Morgan Stanley ranked 6th in the past year as lead underwriter of technology IPOs, according to Dealogic. That's down from No. 1 in the year before Facebook. But when it comes to overall U.S. investment banking fees from tech deals, which also includes mergers and acquisitions and non-IPO stock offerings, Morgan Stanley still ranks No. 1.

    Mack says it's unfair to blame Gorman or any of Morgan Stanley's other bankers for the Facebook flop. A year later, the shares, which went public at $38, still only fetch $26."There were a number of us who said don't price it there," says Mack. "But the Facebook issue was so oversubscribed."

    Mack says Facebook wanted to sell the shares. So Morgan Stanley bankers figured if someone was going to underwrite the extra shares, it might as well be them. Even so, Mack says in the end he believes it was the glitch at the Nasdaq, which delayed trading and caused problems throughout the day of the IPO that ultimately did in the deal.

    Gorman declined to comment for this story. Following the first quarter, in which the firm made nearly $1 billion after losing money last year, Gorman said that he thought many of the firm's biggest issues were behind it.

    Still, it's too soon for Gorman to fly the "mission accomplished" banner. The better earnings in the first quarter still missed analysts' expectations. Hedge fund manager Dan Loeb, who bought 7.6 million Morgan Stanley shares and said he expected the stock price to double, recently revealed in a regulatory filing that his firm Third Point sold its entire stake in the first quarter. Loeb declined to comment. The firm's return on equity has climbed recently to 7.6%, but it is still well below where it was before the financial crisis. And Morgan Stanley's bond trading business significantly lags long-time rival Goldman Sachs (GS) as well as others.

    但这在一定程度上是刻意为之。虽然没有放弃债券市场，但戈尔曼竭力反对扩张这块业务。事实上，他还在裁员，今年全公司范围再裁员1,600个岗位。另外，为了降低成本，他也在想方设法将更多的债券交易自动化。而且，戈尔曼比同行更积极地控制薪酬。今年，摩根士丹利第一次将年终奖100%推迟发放，支付限制性股票而不是预付现金。戈尔曼表示，此举可能触怒一些银行家，但相信他们会留下来。这招险棋走对了。银行家流失数量不多。股价上涨当然也有帮助。

    这些都是戈尔曼向资产管理业务转型计划的一部分（资产管理业务一旦赢得客户，就可以产生持续的经常性收入），远离波动性更大的高风险业务。这一策略似乎正在显效。在美国经济复苏的前半段，摩根士丹利经纪部门的利润停滞不前，现在基本上已和美邦业务合并，利润开始提升。虽然其权益回报率可能不会回到过去的水平，但很多投资者相信摩根士丹利更加稳定的业务结构将为其带来丰厚回报。

    “收费业务的规模大幅膨胀，股票市场回升，这对于投资银行应该也是个利好。”曾在摩根士丹利担任了15年经纪人、如今经营着投资管理公司DLS Capital的大卫•斯坦伯格表示。他表示，他一直在找机会买入这只股票，但迄今还没有机会。“戈尔曼已经挖出了木头中的大部分白蚁。风险比过去低多了。”

    在去年的年度股东大会上，戈尔曼的发言被一些反华尔街抗议者打断，抗议者指责摩根士丹利止赎操作不公、谴责超高的华尔街薪酬以及聘请游说机构阻挠金融改革努力，等等。戈尔曼一度表示，他很“生气，听到有人指责我们的董事会做了不道德的事情，我不会任由事情这样。”虽然如此，戈尔曼还是在超过一小时的时间里冷静地回答了抗议者和其他投资者的提问。

    戈尔曼告诉一位路透社（Reuters）记者称，总体而言，“我认为这相当顺利。”他谈论的是去年那次股东大会，但恰恰也是今年股东大会的写照。（财富中文网）

    But part of that is by design. While not abandoning the bond market, Gorman has resisted calls to double down on the business. Instead, he has continued to cut staff -- he has already eliminated another 1,600 position this year firm-wide -- and has explored ways to automate more of its bond trading in order to lower costs. And Gorman has been more aggressive than his peers in reining in Wall Street pay. This year for the first time Morgan Stanley deferred 100% of its year-end bonuses, paying them out in restricted stock rather than upfront cash. Gorman said the move might anger some bankers, but he thought they would stay. His bet has paid off. There have been few defections. The rising stock price has of course helped.

    It's all part of Gorman's plan to shift the firm towards asset management, which produces consistent reoccurring revenue once you have gained the accounts, and away from Wall Street's more volatile and risky businesses. That bet now seems to be paying off. After stagnating for the first part of the economic recovery, profits at Morgan Stanley's brokerage division, now mostly combined with the Smith Barney acquisition, are starting to rise. And while the firm's ROE might not be going back to where it used to be, many investors think Morgan Stanley will be more richly rewarded for its more stable mix of businesses.

    "The fee business is a lot bigger than it used to be, and with the stock market ramping back up, that should be good for investment banking as well," says David Steinberg, who was a Morgan Stanley broker for 15 years and now runs money management firm DLS Capital. He says he has been looking at buying the stock but hasn't yet. "Gorman has gotten most of the termites out of the woodwork. It's a lot lower risk than it used to be."

    Last year, at the firm's annual meeting, Gorman was interrupted by some anti-Wall Street protestors who accused Morgan Stanley of unfair foreclosure practices, condoning excess Wall Street pay and using lobbyists to thwart financial reform efforts. At one point Gorman said he takes "umbrage at the suggestion that our board did anything unethical, and I can't just let that sit out there." But Gorman, nonetheless, calmly took questions from protestors and other investors for more than an hour.

    Gorman told a reporter from Reuters that, all things considered, "I thought that it was pretty smooth." He was talking about the meeting, but it turned out to be a pretty good prediction for the year ahead.