The short answer is yes. Bank stocks are generally affected by recessions for a couple of reasons. First, interest rates tend to fall during recessions. Second, and more important, unemployment tends to rise during recessions, and more consumers run into financial trouble.However, the longer answer is that every bank is different. Consumer banking (taking in deposits and lending money) is highly cyclical, and this is especially true for banks that specialize in riskier forms of lending such as credit cards. On the other hand, investment banking tends to do even better during turbulent times, so banks that have large investment banking operations tend to see profits hold up quite well.