| Jamie Dimon | |
|---|---|
| Born | James Dimon March 13, 1956 New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Residence | Upper East Side, Manhattan |
| Alma mater | Tufts University (B.A.) Harvard University (M.B.A.) |
| Occupation | Chairman, President & CEO of JPMorgan Chase |
| Board member of | New York Federal Reserve |
| Spouse | Judith Kent |
| Children | Julia, Laura, and Kara Leigh |
James "Jamie" Dimon (born March 13, 1956) is a business executive. He is the current chairman, president and chief executive of JPMorgan Chase, and previously served as a Class A director of the Board of Directors of the New York Federal Reserve, a three year term which started January 2007.[1][2] Dimon was named to Time magazine's 2006, 2008, 2009, and 2011 lists of the world's 100 most influential people. He was also named to Institutional Investor's Best CEOs list in the All-America Executive Team Survey from 2008 through 2011.[3] He was named the CEO of the Year in 2011.[4][5][6]
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James "Jamie" Dimon was born in New York City, to Theodore and Themis Dimon, of Greek descent and attended Browning School.[7]
He majored in psychology and economics at Tufts University, before earning an M.B.A. degree from Harvard Business School along with classmates Jeffrey Immelt, Steve Burke (businessman) and Seth Klarman. When Dimon graduated in 1982, Sandy Weill convinced him to turn down offers from Goldman Sachs,[8] where he worked the previous summer, and Morgan Stanley to join him as an assistant at American Express. Although Weill could not offer the same amount of money as the investment banks, Weill promised Dimon that he would have "fun".[8] Jamie Dimon's father, Theodore Dimon, was an Executive Vice President at American Express. The younger Dimon came to Weill's attention when Theodore passed along an essay that Jamie had written to him.
In a power struggle, Weill left American Express in 1985 and Dimon followed him. The two then took over Commercial Credit, a consumer finance company, from Control Data. Through a series of unprecedented mergers and acquisitions, in 1998 Dimon and Weill were able to form the largest financial services conglomerate the world had ever seen, Citigroup. Dimon left Citigroup in November 1998. It was rumored at the time that he and Weill got into an argument in 1997 over Dimon not giving Weill's daughter, Jessica M. Bibliowicz, a promotion,[9] although that happened over a year before his departure and most accounts cite many other more substantive issues as the real reasons.[10] In his 2005 University of Chicago Graduate School of Business Fireside Chat and 2006 Kellogg School of Management interviews, Dimon stated that Weill fired him.
In March 2000 Dimon became CEO of Bank One, then the nation's fifth largest bank.[11] He became President and Chief Operating Officer of J.P. Morgan Chase in mid-2004 when it purchased Bank One.
In March 2008 he was a board member of the New York Federal Reserve Bank and CEO of J.P. Morgan and made decisions in connection with the $55 billion loan to J.P. Morgan to bail out Bear Stearns.
Following the acquisition of Washington Mutual by JPMorganChase, President Barack Obama had this to say about Dimon's handling of the real-estate crash, credit crisis, and the banking collapse affecting corporations nationwide, including major financial institutions like Bank Of America, Citibank, and Wachovia:
You know, keep in mind, though there are a lot of banks that are actually pretty well managed, JPMorgan being a good example, Jamie Dimon, the CEO there, I don't think should be punished for doing a pretty good job managing an enormous portfolio.[12]
After Obama won the 2008 presidential election, there was some speculation that Dimon would serve in the Obama Administration as United States Secretary of the Treasury. Obama eventually named President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York Timothy Geithner to the position.[13]
Under Dimon's leadership with the acquisitions on his watch, JPMorganChase has now become the leading U.S. bank in domestic assets under management, market capitalization value, and publicly traded stock value. JPMorganChase is also the #1 credit card provider in the United States. J.P. Morgan's investment bank has raised the highest fees since mid-2010 and into 2011.
In 2009, Dimon was considered one of "The TopGun CEOs" by Brendan Wood International, an advisory agency.[14][15]
In 2011, Dimon was involved in two high profile heated exchanges, first on Ben Bernanke, and the second on September 26, 2011 with Bank of Canada's Mark Carney calling Basel III "anti-american".[16]
Dimon's role at the New York Fed "includes approving the Bank's budget, overseeing operations, and appointing the Bank's officers."[17]
As JPMorgan Chase's Chairman, President & CEO, Dimon oversaw the transfer of $25 billion in bailout funds from the US Treasury Department to JPMorgan Chase on October 28, 2008 via the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).[18] This was the fifth largest amount transferred under Section A of TARP[19] to help troubled assets related to residential mortgages. It has been widely reported [20] that JPMorgan Chase was in much better financial shape than other banks and did not need TARP funds but accepted the funds because the Government did not want to single out only the banks with capital issues.
JPMorgan Chase advertised in February 2009 that they would be using their capital base monetary strength to acquire new businesses,.[21]
The US Government, as of February 2009, had yet to move forward in enforcing TARP's intent in funding JP Morgan Chase with $25 billion.[18] Dimon was quoted, during the week of February 1, 2009, in the face of the US government's lack of federal enforcement, as saying
JPMorgan would be fine if we stopped talking about the damn nationalization of banks. We've got plenty of capital. To policymakers, I say where were they? … They approved all these banks. Now they're beating up on everyone, saying look at all these mistakes, and we're going to come and fix it.[21][22]
Of the US's nine largest banks, JPMorgan Chase was arguably the healthiest bank, and did not need to take TARP funds. In order to encourage smaller banks with troubled assets to accept this money, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson allegedly coerced the CEOs of the nine largest banks to accept TARP money under short notice.[23] JPMorgan Chase was also the first of the largest banks to repay the TARP money.
Dimon is a Democrat and worked in Obama's adopted hometown of Chicago. After Obama took office and JPMorgan Chase repaid its bailout money more quickly than most, he became influential in the White House,[24] although Dimon has often publicly disagreed with some of Obama's policies.[25] Dimon was one of three CEOs found by the Associated Press—along with Lloyd Blankfein and Vikram Pandit—to have had liberal access to United States Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner in the seven months after the financial crisis in fall 2008.[26]
Dimon is married to Judith Kent; they have three children: Julia, Laura, and Kara Leigh.
Jamie Dimon was portrayed in the 2011 HBO film Too Big to Fail (film) by Bill Pullman. Jamie Dimon is portrayed in the BBC TV film The Last Days of Lehman Brothers by Michael Brandon.
| Business positions | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by William B. Harrison, Jr. |
JPMorgan Chase CEO 2005-present |
Succeeded by Incumbent |
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