A Letter to Jamie Dimon

In response to the opinion of Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM), which The Wall Street Journal published on June 29, 2009:

Mr. Dimon,

With as little respect as possible, I have to say this commentary is likely the most hypocritical piece of rhetoric any human has ever recorded and I can’t help but wonder whether it made even you a little sick while writing it.

When you suggest that regulation is welcome, do you mean before or after you increase minimum payments on your most loyal cardholding customer base by 2.5 times overnight?

Or was that what you meant about being careful not to regulate too far?

When you talk about how good it is to increase liquidity, did I somehow miss where you voluntarily explain just how many toxic assets are being hidden via mark-to-market accounting practices?

Are you the slightest bit concerned about the size of your glass mansion, when you cast stones at those “who extended absurdly low introductory ‘teaser’ rates”?

At least those “lightly regulated brokers” made people sign blatant disclosures that clearly explained their terms… before selling their loans back to your sorry (self).

When you talk about earning back the trust of the American consumer, do you so quickly forget the aggressiveness with which you solicited consumers with misleading, if not false, solicitations for “life of loan” terms, that you now call back at an unreasonable pace to trigger usurious rate hikes on the resulting defaults.

Do you plan to earn back the trust of the consumer by taking bailout money, which results in tax increases that will likely hit these same consumers the hardest… and then have the audacity to squeeze your most loyal producers in a desperate attempt to make up for your mistakes?

As you irresponsibly push a good portion of these roughly 850,000 consumers to financial bankruptcy… do you contemplate your own moral bankruptcy?

Mr. Dimon, you may be the biggest hypocrite ever to step foot on this planet.

-Seth Chalnick

PS - No Disclosures (how about you?)

Comments

[THofler:]

Puleeze! Mr. Nanny regulator, stop me before I borrow again!

Mr. Dimon is the best of the bank CEOs & has some great ideas for financial reg. reform. But those ideas will never be implemented because no one in congress nor Mr. Chalnick have any significant understanding of what went wrong or what should have gone right to prevent the crisis.

Jul 10 08:14 PM

[Mark54:]

A dirty secret I learned a few years ago... "The Street loves regulation."

When in compliance with strict regulation it gets the blessing of Congress, State Regulators, the consumer, the President, investor, etc. It can seek opportunities and maneuver around the rules and throw its hand up in the air in the end and say "we are a heavily regulated industry.. what more do you want?"

Jul 10 09:18 PM

[Seth Chalnick:]

Actually, "THofler" I can't stand regulation. But if you are going to call me a Nanny, and since Mr. Dimon goes on record as "welcoming unified regulation as a great place to start," then realize that Nanny Regulator implies influence of policy. Perhaps, Nanny Enforcer would be a better choice here, since I am only asking Chase to stick to agreements they already made. And if they are going to break agreements, then at least don’t be hypocritical about it.

You seem big on having people take responsibility for their actions. Why do you seem to make this judgment selectively? And speaking of taking responsibility and having a Nanny to preclude further borrowing… if Mr. Dimon's ideas are so great, then why can't he implement them without the help of congress?

Jul 10 09:20 PM

[pitchingpen...:]

I'll ask the same question of Jamie Dimon, paragon of "Honest Abedness" and Card Carrying ABA Member "Good Banker":

"What university can I go to where I can learn to distill and filter
bullshit, thereby creating absolute, pure bullshit?"

From a previous SA posting:
"Just look at the current strategy of the American Bankers’ Association.

Edward L. Yingling is justifiably proud of his organization’s position as one of the country’s most powerful lobbies.

His testimony (.pdf) to Congress on the potential new Consumer Financial Protection Agency plainly shows where his group stands. The most revealing quote, highlighted in the ABA’s own press release, reads:

"It is now widely understood that the current economic situation originated primarily in the largely unregulated non-bank sector,” he said. “Banks watched as mortgage brokers and others made loans to consumers that a good banker just would not make and they now face the prospect of another burdensome layer of regulation aimed primarily at their less-regulated or unregulated competitors. It is simply unfair to inflict another burden on these banks that had nothing to do with the problems that were created." = Pure Bullshit

Jul 11 05:12 PM

[goingtothedogs:]

The only reason I can come with for this action is that he is hoping that you fail to pay the minimum and then will have to paid the higher rate..

Jul 23 08:08 AM