"JPMorgan Chase paid its CEO $18.7m in 2012" Associated Press, March 23, 2013
NEW YORK — The chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, received $18.7 million in compensation last year, according to regulatory papers the country’s largest bank filed Friday. That’s 19 percent less than in 2011, when his $23 million made him the country’s highest paid bank CEO.
The bank had already said it would dock Dimon’s pay, largely because of a $6 billion loss from a complex derivatives trade that went bad last year.
Related: JPMorgan Made $5 Billion in the Second Quarter
Actually, it was a $9b loss if not more, but who expects truth and accuracy out of AmeriKa's bank-serving business press? Besides, JP is still making good profit so all's well.
Earlier this month, a Senate committee issued a scathing report on JPMorgan that spread the blame for the loss to the bank’s key executives, including Dimon.
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Related:
"Senate panel says JPMorgan misled regulators" by Jessica Silver-Greenberg and Ben Protess | New York Times, March 15, 2013
JPMorgan Chase & Co. ignored internal controls and manipulated documents, while its influential chief executive, Jamie Dimon, withheld some information from regulators as the nation’s biggest bank racked up trading losses last year, a new Senate report says.
Those look like CRIMES to me.
The findings by Senate investigators shed new light on the multibillion-dollar trading blunder, which has claimed the jobs of some top executives and prompted investigations by authorities. The 300-page report, released a day before a Senate subcommittee plans to question bank executives and regulators in a hearing, will escalate the debate in Washington over regulating Wall Street.
And the endless debate goes on while Wall Street is back to business as usual.
Dimon, whose reputation as an astute manger of risk has so far been only dented by the trading losses, comes under much harsher criticism from the Senate investigators. The chief executive blessed changes to an internal alarm system that underestimated losses, seemingly contradicting his earlier statements to lawmakers, according to the report.
Oh, he LIED to LAWMAKERS, huh?
That SURE LOOKS LIKE a IMPRISONABLE OFFENSE to ME!
Dimon is also accused of withholding from regulators details about the bank’s daily losses, then raising his voice in anger at a deputy who later turned over the information.
Related: The Jerks at JPMorgan
Jerk was being nice. Guy is an asshole.
While some people briefed on the matter question whether the outburst actually happened, the alleged incident illustrates a broader problem at JPMorgan: After emerging from the financial crisis in far better shape than rivals, the bank saw itself as being above its regulators. The bank was so filled with hubris, Senate investigators say in the report, that an executive once screamed at its examiners and called them ‘‘stupid.’’
Didn't Obama praise Dimon?
The report, citing some of the same private documents that FBI agents are now poring over, highlights how JPMorgan managers pressured traders to lowball losses by $660 million, a previously undisclosed figure, and then played down the problems to authorities.
But you can trust the pos.
The trader known as the London Whale, who carried out the derivatives trades at the center of the bank’s losses, told a colleague last year that the bank’s estimated losses were ‘‘getting idiotic,’’ according to a transcript of their phone conversation cited by the subcommittee. The trader, Bruno Iksil, added that ‘‘I can’t keep this going’’ and that he didn’t know where his boss ‘‘wants to stop.’’
Federal investigators, seeking Iksil’s side of the story, now expect to visit the trader in his native France, according to people briefed on the investigation.
The breakdowns — at both the bank and at its regulators like the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency — could galvanize support for new curbs on Wall Street trading.
We've been waiting five years for them, and who knows how much longer.
Using its investigation to take a broad swipe at financial risk-taking, the report depicts JPMorgan’s losses as emblematic of a dark market desperate for sunlight.
“Our investigation opens a window into the hidden world of high stakes derivatives trading by a major bank,’’ said Senator Carl Levin, the Michigan Democrat who runs the subcommittee. Calling the bank’s trading strategy a ‘‘runaway train that barreled through every risk warning,’’ he said the bank ‘‘exposed daunting vulnerabilities’’ in the financial system.
A spokeswoman for the bank said on Thursday: ‘‘While we have repeatedly acknowledged significant mistakes, our senior management acted in good faith and never had any intent to mislead anyone.’’
Did he say it with a straight face because I found it impossible to read that lie without laughing.
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Yeah, at least the Senate is getting after him:
"Senators grill JPMorgan executives on losses" by Marcy Gordon | Associated Press, March 16, 2013
WASHINGTON — Two former high-ranking executives at JPMorgan Chase faced tough questions from senators Friday about why the bank played down risks and hid losses from regulators when it was losing billions of dollars.
The hearing was held a day after the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations issued a scathing report that ascribed widespread blame for $6.2 billion in trading losses to key executives at the nation’s biggest bank.
Douglas Braunstein, the former chief financial officer, and Ina Drew, the former chief investment officer overseeing trading strategy, were pressed to explain why bank executives gave federal examiners in April information that significantly understated losses for the first quarter of 2012.
‘‘The number I reported [to the regulators] was the number that was given to me,’’ said Drew, who resigned last spring after the losses became public.
Drew blamed the losses on executives under her watch who failed to control risks out of the London office.
It's called passing the bucks.
The report also suggested that CEO Jamie Dimon was aware of the losses in April, even while he played them down publicly. And Senator Carl Levin, the chairman of the panel, implied that Dimon set a precedent at the bank for withholding information.
Dimon acknowledged in May 2012 that the firm had lost $2 billion on risky trades out of its London office. The losses have since been revised to more than $6 billion.
I heard $9 or more, but....
After reading the report and hearing executives testify that they didn’t know who was responsible for informing regulators, members of the panel questioned whether the bank had grown too large to manage.
The ‘‘trading culture at JPMorgan . . . piled on risk, hid losses, disregarded risk limits, manipulated risk models, dodged oversight and misinformed the public,’’ Levin said Friday at the hearing.
I call it lying.
New York-based JPMorgan acknowledges that it made mistakes but rejects any assertions that it concealed losses or risks.
The bank said in a statement Friday, ‘‘We have made regrettable errors and overhauled our risk policies to correct these mistakes, but senior executives always provided information to regulators and the public that they believed to be accurate.’’
Shameless. Absolutely shameless.
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Related: US orders JPMorgan to tighten rules
I was told they already did that:
"JPMorgan to show report on bad bet" by Jessica Silver-Greenberg | New York Times, January 16, 2013
NEW YORK — The board of JPMorgan Chase voted Tuesday to release an internal report detailing the bad bet — and related management missteps — that cost the nation’s largest bank more than $6 billion, according to several people familiar with the matter.
Since announcing the trading losses in May, JPMorgan Chase has worked to move beyond the fiasco, shuffling senior management, clawing back millions of dollars in compensation from senior executives, and commissioning the internal investigation.
The report, which exceeds 50 pages, is the result of the investigation, led by Mike Cavanagh, JPMorgan’s former chief financial officer.
The losses stemmed from a bungled derivatives bet made by the bank’s Chief Investment Office, which was a little-known unit with offices in London and New York. An aggressive group of traders in London built a large position that distorted the credit market and prompted $6.2 billion in losses.
Some within the bank were wary of releasing the report, which takes aim at lax supervision and risk controls, according to the people who insisted on anonymity because the discussions are not public. One concern was that plaintiff attorneys might seize on the report, the people said.
But Jamie Dimon, the bank’s chief executive, argued that the report should be released.
Oh, he's a real hero then.
The report is expected to be critical of Douglas Braunstein, formerly the bank’s chief financial officer, for failing to strictly monitor the activities of the traders in London.
Oh, never mind. He's fixing (pun intended) the blame on Braunstein.
Ahead of JPMorgan’s earnings announcement Wednesday, the board met to discuss whether to make the report public. Also on the agenda was whether to reduce the bonuses of Dimon and Braunstein. Dimon, these people said, could have his annual payout cut by as much as 20 percent.
Among the six largest US banks, Dimon was the highest-paid chief executive, taking home $23.1 million in 2011. That year, his total pay package was made up of stock and option awards along with a $4.5 million cash bonus.
A spokesman for JPMorgan Chase did not immediately return calls for comment.
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Yup, poor Jamie took a cut:
"After $6b loss, JPMorgan cuts CEO pay; But with $11.5m package he’s still richly rewarded" by Christina Rexrode | Associated Press, January 17, 2013
NEW YORK — America’s best-known banker is getting a big pay cut. JPMorgan Chase said Wednesday that it will dock the pay of CEO Jamie Dimon by more than half, to $11.5 million from $23 million.
But what will he do for food?
It’s the latest fallout from an embarrassing trading loss at the bank last year, one that ballooned to $6 billion. Its ripple effects have been numerous, forcing Dimon to appear contritely before Congress and putting the bank in the cross hairs of regulators and lawmakers.
He didn't appear that way to me. He appeared to be the arrogant shit he is.
The pay cut did not come as a surprise on Wall Street. What set it apart was that it amounted to a reprimand of a chief executive who remains popular and well regarded, despite the stain of a trading loss Dimon once dismissed as a ‘‘tempest in a teapot.’’
And even as it cut his pay, the board praised Dimon for responding ‘‘forcefully’’ to the trading loss, presiding over an overhaul of risk management, and booting out responsible executives. A task force report placed most of the blame on other executives and traders who have since left.
Compensation consultant James F. Reda was underwhelmed, though. He called the pay cut ‘‘ceremonial,’’ a way for the bank to do penance.
‘‘He doesn’t need the money,’’ Reda said. ‘‘He was probably very proactive in accepting this to keep people off his back.”
Dimon’s job was never seriously in danger, and the pay cut has not changed that perception. Wall Street saw it less as an indictment and more as a sign of a commitment to taking the trading loss seriously.
‘‘It’s bitter medicine, but he swallowed it and is moving on,’’ said James Post, a corporate governance expert who teaches at Boston University. ‘‘I think that still leaves him in a very strong leadership position.”
Yeah, the poor liar and looter.
JPMorgan emerged from the financial crisis as one of the strongest US banks, a winner in a meltdown that forced others to their knees.
No kidding. What a coincidence.
Its blockbuster fourth-quarter earnings, released Wednesday, will almost certainly cement it as the most profitable US bank of 2012.
I searched my printed Globes for the exact amount of billions, but couldn't find it.
Related:
"JPMorgan turned in a strong fourth quarter. Earnings shot up to $5.3 billion"
Yeah, that's billion with a B -- for three months "work."
How interesting that was cut from the official web and print versions -- especially when it is the same article.
Such accomplishments have made Dimon one of the best known, and most outspoken, bank leaders of his generation, even in a time of heightened scrutiny and public anger about the industry.
Anger that is more than justified. Dimon and his ilk are the worst excuses for a human being I've ever seen.
Some of his peers have tried to stay under the radar, but he has spoken out against many new regulations — including some, the bank’s critics say, that could have prevented the trading loss.
Dimon has chafed at criticism of banking’s big pay packages, including President Obama’s famous ‘‘fat-cat bankers’’ comment. ‘‘Acting like everyone who’s been successful is bad and because you are rich, you are bad — I don’t understand it, I don’t get it,’’ he told an investment conference.
He's right, he doesn't get it. Such is the disease known as greed.
Asked for thoughts on his pay cut, Dimon said he respected the board’s decision. Pressed for his ‘‘gut feeling,’’ he replied, ‘‘Nope, you’re not gonna get it.’’
Asshole.
When analyst Guy Moszkowski asked about the ‘‘exotic investment strategies’’ of the Chief Investment Office, where the loss occurred, he shot back, ‘‘It has got not a damned thing to do with exotic investment strategies — zero, nada, nothing. OK?’’
Real asshole.
For 2012, Dimon will get $1.5 million in salary and $10 million in restricted stock awards. It probably means he will no longer be the highest-paid CEO at the country’s six mega-banks.
Awwwwww, Jamie's cryin'!
Even with a pay cut, Dimon, 56, will be well paid. Median pay for CEOs of S&P 500 companies in 2011 was $9.6 million, Equilar says.
So he's still in the upper half, huh?
Dimon is eager to put the loss behind him.
But the bank has received requests for information from Congress, the Department of Justice, Securities and Exchange Commission, Commodity Futures Trading Commission, UK Financial Services Authority, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and others.
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"Regulators’ glare on banks softens" by Jack Ewing | New York Times, January 21, 2013
NEW YORK — Two years ago, Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, told an audience in Davos, Switzerland, that people should stop picking on bankers. Dimon is still waiting for his wish to come true.
Bankers, always a big presence at the World Economic Forum in Davos, arrive this year under less regulatory pressure and with better profits than in past years.
Related: Interesting Bank Post
At least someone is doing well in this economy. All those Fed handouts sure do come in handy.
But they are still on the defensive....
Awww, the poor f***ing looters!
This isn't journalism, this is shit!
International bankers are under pressure from the law enforcement authorities....
Really?
UBS, based in Zurich, agreed to pay a $1.5 billion fine to the global authorities after admitting this month that it had helped manipulate a benchmark rate used to set mortgage and other interest rates.
Yeah, it is called LIBOR and the BANKS BLED TRILLIONS out of CONSUMERS!
It is probably the GREATEST FINANCIAL SWINDLE in HISTORY and all UBS got was a CHUMP CHANGE FINE!
Still, bankers may find the atmosphere in Davos a bit more congenial than in some recent years. There appears to be a growing sentiment that banks have taken enough abuse.
This month in Basel, Switzerland, for instance, an international gathering of central bankers and bank supervisors relaxed new rules that were intended to ensure banks would be able to survive an event like the collapse of Lehman Bros. in 2008.
The rules, which are not binding but serve as a benchmark for national regulators, would require banks to maintain a 30-day supply of cash or liquid assets that are easy to convert into cash. But after the decision in Basel this month, banks would have until 2019 to accumulate the additional cash and assets, instead of 2015.
The regulators also broadened the types of assets that could be used to include even some mortgage-backed securities — the same general class of security that was at the heart of the crisis.
Like I said, they are BACK to FRAUD, I mean, BUSINESS as USUAL, folks. Dodd-Frank was a failure because it left the writing of the rules to the Fed and Obama administration. Years later they are still "working on them."
Many analysts see the decision as a gift to the banking industry....
That a surprise coming from the international bankers conference?
The discussions at Davos may offer clues about whether the Basel decisions foreshadow other concessions.
There is a risk that efforts to rein in financial risk could lose momentum as the trauma of Lehman’s collapse fades, Cornelius K. Hurley, a law professor at Boston University, said. ‘‘We said to ourselves, back in 2008, a crisis is a terrible thing to waste,’’ he said. ‘‘It seems the farther away we get, the evidence is that we are wasting it.’’
Amazing how this one -- as opposed to the "terrorist attacks" of 9/11 or the Sandy Hook hoax -- was wasted, huh?
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Yeah, the poor, poor bankers:
"Bank executives on defensive at Davos; Scandals spur critics to call for more regulation" by David McHugh | Associated Press, January 24, 2013
DAVOS, Switzerland — If there is one place bankers should be able to let down their guard a little, you would think it would be at the World Economic Forum in Davos, an exclusive gathering of 2,500 of the globe’s financial and corporate elite.
Yet even here, top banking executives are finding themselves on the defensive.
Am I supposed to feel sorry for them?
It’s a reflection of how big banks — blamed by some politicians and the public for the 2007 financial crisis and the resulting recession — are still grappling with pressure from recent scandals and moves toward increasingly complex regulation.
During a panel discussion on global finance, Jamie Dimon, chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, criticized the ‘‘huge misinformation’’ about the risks actually posed by banks.
He and other top bankers at the discussion, including UBS chairman Axel Weber, found themselves stressing that that banks play an essential role in making economies grow by lending to businesses so they can invest and expand.
‘‘Banks continue to lend and grow and expand, and finance is a critical part of the how the economy is run,’’ he said at the discussion, where he was challenged by a top International Monetary Fund official.
Usurious interest rates and back-stabbing, double-dealing schemes are not good for an economy, sorry.
In fact, the whole private central banking model has proved to be nothing more than the WORLD'S GREATEST RIP-OFF SCHEME in ALL HISTORY!
‘‘Everyone I know is trying to do a very good job for their clients,’’ Dimon said.
Incorrigible asshole.
There have been plenty of negative headlines and investigations over the last year that show banking in a far harsher light: Several top banks are under investigation for rigging key interest rates, HSBC has been fined for allowing money laundering, and Standard Chartered has been penalized for dealing with Iran.
Yeah, it's money laundering for Mexican drug cartels.
Also see: Boston Globe Makes a Quick British Withdrawal
All of which has only given ammunition to the critics who say banks are too loosely regulated, too unethical, and still so large that their collapse would threaten the economy.
Related:
"Attorney General Eric Holder told the Senate Judiciary Committee that the nation’s banks had become too big to jail. “The size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them,” Holder said at a hearing Wednesday. “If we do prosecute — if we do bring a criminal charges — it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy.”"
A pretty powerful figure agrees.
Governments and regulators have moved to clamp down on banks and their risky practices since 2007. In the United States, legislation known as Dodd-Frank seeks to avoid taxpayer-funded bailouts of banks by barring them from engaging in risky trading on their own account. The European Union is considering proposals to have banks separate their riskier investment banking operations from the rest of their business. Meanwhile, the British government is moving toward a different proposal to require banks to ‘‘ring-fence’’ their retail banking within their organization.
Beyond that, banks are also being required to hold more financial padding against possible losses through an international agreement known as Basel III.
However, the push to regulate leaves many dissatisfied. Critics of the banking industry assert that some of the new measures — such as requirements to hold capital buffers against losses — were in fact around ahead of the 2007 crisis but were ineffective because the banks found ways around them.
In other words, NOTHING HAS CHANGED, NOTHING AT ALL!!!!!! It's all been SHOW SHIT for you, folks, and we all know why. GOVERNMENTS SERVE BANKS, not citizens!
Banks themselves agree that the capital measures are needed, but they are concerned that, because these new rules are often being imposed on a national or regional basis, they can overlap for banks that do business in more than one country. And there is no one global standard that would level the playing field, and prevent banks from simply moving their operations to places that allowed high-risk practices.
Min Zhu, the deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund, said the banking industry was ‘‘still too big’’ compared to the size of the global economy. Min also warned that other financial organizations, such as hedge funds, are playing a too-large, too-little regulated role known as ‘‘shadow banking’’ where risky practices that could cause a crisis remain beyond a regulator’s reach.
And government has kept regulators from that market, although I'm hard-pre$$ed as to why.
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Was that the criminal Chris Lagarde I saw in that picture?
Globe really didn't cover much of the conference, at least not in print.
Also see:
"JPMorgan, MF Global trustee reach agreement" Associated Press, March 21, 2013
NEW YORK — JPMorgan Chase has agreed to a deal that will return $546 million to former customers of trading firm MF Global Holdings Ltd., which collapsed in 2011 with $1.6 billion missing from its accounts.
So some of that missing money went to JPMorgan, huh?
MF Global failed after a calamitous bet on European debt spooked its investors, partners, and clients.
JPMorgan held MF Global funds in several accounts and also processed the firm’s securities trades. The trustee tasked with getting customers’ money back, James W. Giddens, threatened to sue the New York bank if it didn’t return money that was transferred to the bank from MF Global. By June 2012, JPMorgan had returned $608 million to the firm....
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Related: MoFo Global
A bunch of them over at JPMorgan, too.
UPDATE:
"JPMorgan OK’s credit card deal" Associated Press, July 25, 2012
NEW YORK — JPMorgan Chase & Co. has agreed to pay $100 million to settle a lawsuit by customers who claim the nation’s largest bank improperly increased minimum payments on their credit card bills.
The proposed settlement would end a three-year-old case against Chase for raising the cardholders’ minimum payment to 5 percent of account balances from 2 percent in 2008 and 2009. Cardholders claim Chase did it to make extra money on fees it charged to people who could not meet higher payments.
We call it stealing here at the MSM Monitor.
The settlement was disclosed in a filing Monday with the US District Court in San Francisco.
In the court document, Chase argued that increasing the monthly payments was a reasonable and sensible response to unprecedented economic turmoil and impending regulatory changes.
Unreal.
JPMorgan didn’t respond to request for comment on Tuesday.
A judge plans to review the settlement in August.
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