저자: 제이미다이먼 · 외국인
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결론: 다이먼은 단기 실적은 좋지만 장기 리스크(지정학·재정적자·금리)를 경계하며, 장기국채 매수에는 부정적이고 주식은 종목별로 본다는 입장이다. 실적과 경기: 최근 분기 순이익 212억 달러(41% 증가)는 역대급이나 이는 고거래량·고자산가격 환경 덕분이며 영원히 지속되지는 않는다고 봤다. 경기와 주식 환경은 양호하다고 평가했다. 지정학·리스크: 2008년과 코로나를 제외하고도 테일 리스크가 더 크다고 보며, 우크라이나 전쟁, 중동 테러, 이란, 글로벌 재정적자, 미중 관계 등을 열거했다. 시장이 이미 일부 반영했을 수 있으나 실제 발생 가능성은 시장보다 높게 본다. 이란·에너지: 과거 원유 공급 충격에도 경제가 버틴 것은 에너지 의존도 감소와 공급망 조정 덕분이라 봤다. 다만 임계점이 존재할 수 있다고 경고했다. 이란 문제는 장기간 경제 압박으로 해결해야 하며 가스가격 상승을 감수할 가치가 있다는 입장이다. 안보·공급망: 서방이 희토류, 반도체, 원료의약품 등에서 적대국 의존도가 높아 보안·회복력 이니셔티브를 추진 중이라고 설명했다. 미국의 군사·경제 리더십은 필수라고 강조했다. 재정적자·채권: 글로벌 부채/GDP는 약 100%, 재정적자는 약 5~6%로 높다. 언젠가 문제가 되며 고금리·채권시장 충격(채권 자경단) 형태로 나타날 가능성이 크다고 봤다. 장기국채는 개인적으로 매수하지 않겠다고 밝혔고, 현재 장기금리 수준이 인플레이션 대비 충분하지 않다고 평가했다. 미국채금리는 장기적으로 상승 압력이 있다는 취지로 해석된다. AI: AI는 실제 가치를 창출하지만 투자 대비 수익(ROI)은 기대만큼은 아닐 것이라 봤다. 인터넷 버블처럼 승자와 패자가 갈리며 기업들은 지출을 더 규율 있게 할 것이다. 일자리 우려는 정당하지만 현재는 AI·사이버 일자리가 늘고 있다고 말했다. 주식·종목: S&P500 같은 지수 투자자는 아니며 종목별로 판단한다고 밝혔다. 현재 가격에서 대량 매수할 종목은 없다고 했다. 시장 가격이 완벽한 결과를 반영하는지에 대해서는 '완벽은 아니지만 좋은 결과 수준'이며 이익 증가로 성장해 들어갈 수 있다고 봤다. 하락장이 오면 상황은 달라진다고 덧붙였다. 스페이스X·스타링크: 스페이스X IPO에 관해 상장 가격 결정은 수많은 투자자 판단의 결과라고 설명했다. 스타링크와 우주 데이터센터 구상에 긍정적이다. 출연자 전망: 다이먼은 단기 낙관, 중장기 신중 입장을 유지했으며, 장기국채 비매수, 지수보다 종목 선별, 신규 대규모 매수 없음이 핵심이다.
다듬은 글
Let's go in the short term first of all though and your earnings just a few days ago. Blockbuster the highest ever quarterly profit uh 21.2 billion up 41%. I don't want to put a negative question on it but can can things go on that well? So you know listen first of all we build a company for the long run and obviously we deal you mentioned crisis and ups and down.
We're clearly in a very almost as good as it gets environment for banks high volumes high asset prices you know a lot of people trade etc. So this can go on for a while. It will eventually end, you know, and uh but it it's not how we run the bank. I run the bank. We serve clients. We serve them around the world.
We serve them every day. We invest through thick or thin. I remind people our best year wasn't the year we made the most money. Our best year was the year we had only a 7% return in tangible equity. It was n it was 2008 and that outperformed everybody and that was our finest moment in a in a relative sense and I guess setting setting you up for the long term and as you say that the current environment we had again good economic data this morning on the retail sales front the environment for your stock is good the environment for your company good environment for the economy is good at the same time do you think the probability of a major risk suddenly arising is a bit higher than you know you've been in charge for 20 years if you took out 2008 and and COVID is is the the risk the tail risk bigger than outside of those moments.
I think I mean first I was very intelligent to say it was the probability because you know we don't know which probability is baked into the market there is something baked in I tell people if you said the market's going to fall 40% there's only a 10% chance that's 4%. That's one PE turn. So it's possible something's baked in what's not baked in is that actually happens and and such.
So I do think if you made and I always do this just as a exercise make a list of all those really complex long-term geopolitical tectonic plates things that affect the market or may not and they may you know mix and match in a certain way you don't understand. So you have wars in Ukraine terrorism in the Middle East obviously Iran uh great global deficits remilitarization the world you know America's relationship with China so there are a lot of things out there which you know could cause a problem but again they might not.
I hope they all resolved properly and that's you know what most governments want but uh but I I do think those risks are probably bigger than other people think. You you said on the earnings call that the well the US economy but the global economy quite impressively shrugged off oil price spikes with Iran um and then it was quite resilient in the face of that.
That said fighting's obviously started again. The straight is obviously shut again. How much do you think of that resilience from March, April, May was because oil stocks were high and and if this current shutting of the straight persists, might we not be so lucky this time around? Yeah, I don't think the resiliency was from uh oil stocks and stuff like that.
I think it was first was amazing. If you look what happened, you know, we lost 20 million barrels a day, but China's cut back 5 million. They took down the reserves. We took down our reserves. They moved 5 million barrels to other side to another, you know, the Red Sea as opposed to that. It was amazing how the adjustment took place.
you know, if you'd asked people before and they didn't forecast that, but I think that's just one of the issues. I mean, there were, you know, we've obviously had the war in Ukraine going on for a long time, you know, trade negotiations. Uh, I think it's and and the global deficits I I look at them and I don't know when and how they might cause a problem, but I would not take that off the list.
The thing is I think is likely at least my current hypothesis is that the world economy is more diversified and therefore more resilient far less reliant on energy as a component input and you know that makes more resin but that does not mean that there's not a tipping point and you know tipping points are weird things when you see them because you've seen them you know all through history and there's always a concurrence of different types of events that cause it.
Uh it just may be it's a lot harder to get there. You may need more straws in the camel's back to cause that tipping point. Um and even this even this current you know the war start up again it may be that's not enough to do it. You know if the president sought your advice or or if you're giving the advice can we afford as a country to to pursue military objectives in in Iran for months from now the economy can can handle that.
Of course you have to really separate like the really important subject from the economy. Like the economy I mean with all due respect about the economy you don't want gas prices up. We don't want unemployment and stuff like that. But but you know, Winston Churchill got you guys through, you know, 18 months where he stood alone against Hitler all by yourselves.
Could the economy withstand that? Not really. Did you guys what do you call you know do it? You did it, you know, with with him and standing behind you. And and so you know this Iran whether you like what happened with this Iran war or not, I think it's naive to act like it isn't a major not a threat to the world.
They've been killing and murdering people for 47 years. They can't have nuclear weapons. Something's got to be done. Why we allowed all this and proxy wars endlessly and you know these proxy wars been going on and so it just it just it's a it's a situation that needs to be resolved. I think it would take fortitude.
You I think a president would have to go to the American people and say this is important. We're going to resolve it. I can resolve it without any military deaths or put 100,000 of your kids on the field and you know get ally support but we are going to you know have this strategy basically economic you know just tighten down an economy until they you know until they say we're we're done and that could happen it may take a year and gas prices may go up but is that a better outcome than them having a nuclear weapon in 10 years yeah and I wouldn't even compare the economy to that one is maybe life and death for mankind the other one is the economy
and your security and resiliency initiative is linked to that you want to make sure that the economy is always capable of these things. Yeah. That's our effort to to help you know just a deep recognition that we the western world and I put UK in that category in Europe we became overreiant on potential adversaries for things like rare earth semiconductors active pharmaceutical ingredients and every nation wants to be secure and resilient and it's a different thing for every nation some some people don't have enough food some have energy some uh you know you in the Europe needs LG at least most Europe needs LG and so that was our effort to say you know what instead of talking about it do something about it so security resilience initiative.
you know, it's literally cutting across drones and cyber and space and AI and APIs and semico what can we do from large companies to vendors to venture capital uh we've as you know we rolled it out in the UK you know the western world needs to get its act together to make sure it's safe and secure and uh and in particularly America you know you America's already stretched a little bit and then things like you know you look at we didn't have enough productive capability to triple production of Patriot missiles we should have planned for that you know in some very basic stuff we have to I call this policy issues not like directly military.
So uh but I think I mean I think for your viewership American leadership America having the permanent economy permanent military and the pyramid economy are probably critical for a free safe and democratic world. So I put this in the category of absolute necessity. It's not a maybe it's not a it's a budget item.
It's like we need to do this to to keep to stay safe. Mhm. No, I I think I I think we would agree with that whether we're in the UK or the US. Um, you mentioned government deficits there and it's obviously not just a US problem at all. Uh, it's certainly a UK problem, French problem, Japanese problem.
I guess how high on the list of risks is that for you and do you think it's a problem that we will solve calmly over five or 10 years before it catches up with one of those countries and goes up? Global deficit, debt to GDP 100%. Ours is 100%. Europe on average is 100%. I think you guys are not quite 100%.
Maybe a little bit over. And your deficit is less. Ours is 6%. You know, the world's deficit is almost 5%. These are very high debt numbers and very high deficit numbers. And we're actually doing quite well. You know, usually you have to have like a great recession or a depression to have or war to have numbers like that.
And so my view is it will become a problem. It's better we deal with it maturely and sit down, you know, and we tried years ago with Paul Ryan and President Obama, you know, but form a group, come together, acknowledge a problem and come a solution. That would be far the far better way to do it. The other way is to wait for it to become a problem.
And my guess is that's what's going to happen. And that'll exhibit itself with, you know, higher interest rates, you know, uh, the market getting rattled a little bit, uh, uh, people talking about constantly, remember the bond markets, the bond vigilantes. Hopefully not worse than that, but it could be worse than that.
At the moment, long longdated government bonds, would you be a buyer of those? But personally, no. I I think, you know, I know the inflation numbers were good yesterday. And again, the other thing about numbers, you dig into these numbers. I mean really dig into them and you I wouldn't give them too much credence.
They they kind of have some consistency month by month, but the actual numbers themselves I think Kevin Worsh is right to say let's look at how all these things get calcul which ones react to and uh how you weigh and balance them. I would not be a buyer and part of it is interest rates. You know inflation I mean even if inflation was 2% the 10-year bond should probably be at four and a half or four to four and a half and the short rate should be you know at three and a quarter or three and a half and they're almost there today.
So I don't understand what the upside is even if you think inflation go to two 2%. And by it's been over 3% for almost five years and you know went up to four now recently because the gas price coming down is down. It may very well tick down but you know I you know being an economic historian. I I I can't take out of my mind what happened you know after the great recession of 74.
Deficits were less you know guns and butter because the Vietnam war was over was away. Uh and it climbed you know from 3 and a half% to 5% to 7% to 9% to 11%. Yeah. And you could say well oil is a big component there. There was the oil crisis of uh 73 and then 80. Yes. You know unions were more powerful all these reasons but it didn't stop.
Let's talk about AI. I mean I know you think really carefully about when you make an investment as a company. Do you think all of the investment we're seeing in it at the moment by corporations across America will have a positive ROI on the investments? So I look AI I mean for the it is real and and and it's a technologies which will cure cancers.
Your children are going to live to 100. The afflictions we had are going to be less. It's going to invent drugs and you know errors in hospitals and errors in cars and I mean it should be great for mankind. And obviously there are downsides sometimes like there were to airplanes and pharma and that is a role of government to figure out how to regulate it.
Make sure you get the best out of it not the worst out of it. But um and then and then there's the job issue which I think you know I I think it's a legitimate issue to raise. I don't think it's a legitimate get breathless over because right now it's creating more jobs. I read today there were 8 million available AI and cyber jobs.
So it's just we got to re retool our training systems and we need to do this right away anyway which is you know that people can quickly get reskilled and retrained in something that's productive. There are a lot of jobs you know they're open up in the trades very highpaying jobs there. I just mentioned AI and cyber jobs and companies themselves going to be doing a lot of that.
When I look at AI itself the amount of money being spent is huge. Will it in total pay off? Probably just like the internet did. Will it pay off the way you expect on the timet you expect? Definitely not. And you know remember so we had Yahoo and know Netscape and all these companies that went bankrupt but Google made it you know Facebook made it like and these are big powerful companies and then there all these ancillary benefits from the internet uh like your iPhones and your things like that.
So yes it it is a powerful tool that will create a huge amount of value. companies will become very disciplined in how they spend their money on it because as you pointed out companies will look at you know okay I put $100 million in this what I'm what am I getting you know like MPVS and values and so there's that and that will cause some of the issues out there but what you willing to pay for what are you not willing to pay for you find cheaper ways to do it we're already finding a lot of cheap ways to do things today you know and and there are new tech there are people writing code now that will send your queries to the the cheapest and fastest depending what you as opposed to, you know, right now when coders do it themselves, they they just use the one they like and it may be the most expensive one and they're using it for a very simple simple thing.
Do do you think as you look step back and look at the the market as a whole, we're pricing in the perfect outcome at the moment. I said probably not perfect, but probably a good outcome. Profits are way up. You know, you can grow into that even if it's high, but you know, if you have a downturn, then obviously you that's a different story.
So sort of give us a gist in the same way you did for longdated bonds like S&P 500 here. Are you a buy of that? I I when I come when I do things when it comes to equities is name by name. I I'm not an index kind of person. Have you bought any equities recently? Uh no I have not. Have you said in general my big buy at this price?
No. But but if you came to me and said you know that I this is a great investment I would consider doing it. So with the SpaceX IPO itself, obviously he's now just I think today is about round. It's back to its IPO price. How how directly involved you don't do individual IPOs, but you were quite involved with this one.
You had Elon on just beforehand. How much did you think about that price? Quite a bit. But you have to understand about the price. It's not what you want or don't want. You have hundreds, thousands of very smart people, you know, saying what they would do and how they would do it and how they value it.
and you know you need a clearing price and so uh that's much more sets the price you know and this this is unique because they said that there's a price which is kind of a different way to do it but then people say am I willing to buy at that price and and uh and you can see all the debates and all the arguments you know it is an extraordinary company that I do know for sure I went to visit it uh and Starlink is an extraordinary product and company part of star SpaceX you know I've seen numbers on the data centers in space that can actually work, you know.
So, no, this this actually works. There are some technical issues about, you know, getting data back here, which they would do by laser, you know, and then the technical issue is like with the weather's bad and you just move the laser to another part of the planet by moving to another satellite. But if it works, you're talking about very cheap energy, very cheap cooling, very stable, you know, you don't you don't get the vibrations in space you get here.
Uh, and it solves this, you know, where do you put the data center issue? So, you know, look, these these are unbelievable things. So, um, and Starlink has 10,000 satellites up there. The next version, V3, is going to have 100,000. And if you've used Star Starlink V2 version two, it's extraordinary.
It It's particularly extraordinary in the English countryside where you have no other connectivity. That's my point. Yeah. Um, I had Lloyd Blankfine on the podcast a few a few months ago and we were talking a lot about the financial crisis. Um, and he was talking about the first requirement. This was his quote.
The first requirement of any business is to stay in business. You can recover from losses and live to fight another day. You can't recover from being dead. But he went on to say that in 2008 there was a 15 to 20% chance that Goldman Sachs could have gone bust- which struck me as quite a revelation in light of in light of that quote.
Looking back now, 18 years on, was there a 15 to 20% chance that JP Morgan could have gone bust? No chance. Zero chance. we we had far more capital and far more liquidity uh than most people out there. I I I think the way you know I was always prepared for and if you look at a lot of companies I don't want to point to anyone their le leverage ratio had gone up like this in the seven years beforehand the day I got to JP Morgan which is before I became the CEO
2004 oh you I was like it's too much I already did you know we already did stress testing and I I agree with Lloyd by the way that you got to be prepared to live I always said what's the worst case how bad can it get if it gets there can you handle it by unit and then I add it all together and say well if every unit came to worst play at the same time.
Can you handle it? That's even though that would almost never happen. So, um uh very and I and I was very cautious by '07. I I guess um you know, you didn't just make it through the crisis as you said 2008 you had a positive ROE was a fantastic year in a relative sense, but you didn't just emerge from the crisis.
You know, you are quite comfortably now the biggest bank in the world. When you took over in 2006, you were third or fourth biggest in the US. You've grown about eightfold since then to $900 billion market cap. The rivals that were bigger than you then have grown about 1.5 to two times. You're more than double your your biggest rival now.
Back then, were you confident you'd get the bank to where it is now? No. No. I I just Did you always have a personal belief? No. No. I I didn't look at it that way. I I think I think you get in trouble if you say I want to be the biggest bank in the world. I always look at it kind of the same which is you I love you know Tom Brady and M Pton Manning you know they they say they didn't have the best arm they weren't and they weren't good runners but they became the best co they worked every day they put the shoulder pads on every play every practice every thing and just so I was always better branches better people better systems better this look at the competition you know build the business build it the right way build the right people you know fix your mistakes I mean rapid recognition errors is a very important risk management tool uh and just continuously build and you know we weren't number one in a lot of businesses back then even say we're quite critical of ourselves because when they when people say to me to mean we're number one I say yeah no you're not gold is number one in that
you know and they're number one in that and they're number two in Vietnam and we're number seven you know and at a very detailed level you know you when you look at those details it's a little humbling you're not that as good as you think sometimes and so just constantly building so I did not expect it I have a dream one day we'd be, you know, the uh a star, you know, in the World Cup.
Yeah. But that was more of a dream. That wasn't a even a target at the time. Getting through those tough moments, it reminded me of, I guess, the pressure you must have felt in in moments like the peak of the financial crisis. And whilst I know you have this amazing team around you that you must bounce ideas off and and decide whether to do things or not, the decisions are ultimately yours to make.
And if we took say you know the decision to buy best sterns and take onto your balance sheet all this risk that you didn't have beforehand as you said you had zero chance of going bust before that I just wonder how lonely that is sometimes and and even you finished the due diligence for a big decision.
H how do you then make that final call? Are you sitting on the desk by yourself? How do you buy a company? Do you sign a piece of paper? Is that it? That's you you have a very good point. So first of all we did a lot of well I I do have great teams and we go through it like people you're not guessing like we went through on that every asset every loan every trade we went through their systems their litigation their personnel records their uh so by the time we knew we've done merges before you know consolidating which is really hard to do you know complex systems and stuff like that so we actually went through all of that and the price was right I say there was a huge in this case a huge margin of error in the price you know they had 12 billion book value.
We're buying it for it ultimately became a billion all of which we wrote off by the way. So I tell people we knew that was we needed that to to clean up the balance sheet basically and merge the companies. Um and we had the management team was going to run it the next day. So we we were in pretty good shape.
You say, "Okay, you're about to fight a war." Well, you got an army, you got the people, you know what you're doing. But when you that last thing when the board has voted and they bring and you actually have to sign the piece of paper and you know when you're signed that piece of paper that you've just committed the company not just yourself you know you just committed your 150 50,000 people at the time you know to backbreaking scary work for 12 months and that your shareholder would be under pressure uh that you know this would create political pluses and minuses.
Yeah. you know, you're you're entering a mous drum that you could have avoided at this particular case that was good for the country that JBmore could handle it that we were going to get something of benefit out of it was you know had a commercial plus to it but uh yeah you feel a pit in your stomach and that when you feel a pit in your stomach that is lonely too I bet you are kind of by yourself and signing that piece
and a massive deal like that is closed by you sign do you keep the pen like that you don't know where the pen is no um I want to talk a little bit about New York and then and then the UK more specifically ally. I mean, there's lots going on in New York at the moment around the edges and more significantly, obviously, you've built this fantastic new building.
Are you committed to New York City regardless, or are there certain things that the mayor or the governor could do that would force you to say too much? Yeah, I I wouldn't make it binary like that. I've pointed out I've actually told this to the mayor, that our headcount in New York has gone from 35,000 to 26,000 in the last 20 years.
And in Texas, it's gone from like 11,000 to 35,000. And it's it's where's it attractive to do business? Why are you doing business there? Where do people want to live? So, it's not just the taxes, but it is the taxes. It's the medical, it's the hospitals, it's the social life, it's the commute, it's the housing.
And you know, if a good if a mayor wants to do a good job, they have to be thinking about all that because they have to compete, you know, and you go way back, you know, New York City, there are a lot of comp there weren't as many competitive cities. Now there are a lot of wonderful I love London you know it's a competitive city so you have choices and people are going to vote not because their ideology but for the for their family or their pocketbook or their uh or they prefer the lifestyle the weather or the parks or whatever it is and so uh you know if governments do the wrong thing they will work adversely.
You see that happening in state after state and you see the adverse effects in place like Texas. They're open to business. They have low tax rates, low individual tax rates and that's quite great universities, you know, graduating great kids, you know, easy for you to buy a house and have a family. Uh, and those things matter because not just you, it's your what your people want, what the options are.
And so, um, and on the UK, what's your message to the new prime minister, Andy Bernham? I don't know. I I would say the same thing. if I want him to succeed. I want to see the UK thrive. I want London to succeed. I'd like London to be your home for a long period of time. It's been a wonderful home for us.
But the UK, like everybody else, and like my own country, so you know, don't yell at me and tell me I'm a angry American. If we don't do the right things, you know, around immigration and taxation and regulation and healthcare and affordability, affordability is not a Democrat or Republican issue or or taking care of our lower paid citizens.
You need a strong economy to do that. A strong economy will benefit all of your citizens, you know, and and just travel around the world and look what happens when, you know, when bad policies muck up a country. So, you know, the the the new chances can be good policies that actually cause growth. And growth, good policies are free and growth is the best antidote.
Growth also helps the lowest paid people the most. Sometimes you look like you're doing a policy that's in benefit of a big company or wealthy people, but it's growth which will drive it for everybody and and and it also creates the wealth of the nation that they can use to fix schools and roads and hospitals and all of that.
So, you know, I I'm praying that they get policy right and government after government get it wrong. And look and look at Europe would be a primary example that, you know, they've been slowly slipping on, you know, most measures of of economic competitiveness and it's a bad idea. Mhm. you know, and it's not and that is not helping the lower paid people, which is what, you know, people on the left and the right say.
One tax that's talked about a lot is the banks levy. Um, it's a 3% extra corporate tax that that other sectors don't have. And there's there's two different taxes we have there. Extra. Yes. And and it used to be 8%, Richie Sunnak brought it down to 3%. What if that went back up again? It would be one more negative on that bucket of things you got to think about.
Look, I I thought I always thought it was wrong. You know, JP Morgan did not damage the UK and I called the chancellor at the time. Uh did not damage the UK. We're a great citizen there. We hire people there. We want to be bigger there. We train people there. We hire veterans there. We have programs of people.
We have medical. All of our people get medical and all this stuff like that. And I just thought [clears throat] lack principle to punish a company. It had nothing to do with the crisis. Didn't cause the crisis. And it's still there 20, you know, what is it? Six, seven years later. Is that fair to is that fair to shareholder?
I mean, it may sound great, you know, tax the banks, but it's $5 billion that my shareholders paid uh on that extra tax and you know, I just I just think things like that have adverse consequences. So, if a government decides to do, there's nothing I can do, but it will over time cause decisions made that they may not like.
The new Canary Warf building you announced the day after Rachel Reed's last budget when she didn't put that up, would you U-turn on that building? Well, that's be that's again, it's a binary. I wouldn't make I don't know what I do. I wouldn't make a binary decision like that. I thought Rachel did a great job, by the way.
Um I want London to be our happy home for a long time. I I would I would be very cautious if I was a government thinking that penalizing any company, you know, out of the ordinary is a good thing for that country. and and what they would what they should have in in my view is a competitive tax system that's consistent and conducive to capital formation that'll drive a country drive the growth of a country.
That is what they should do. If you if you have a uncompetitive tax system, you know, capital leaves your country and if capital leaves your country, it goes to other countries and and and you see that and now you see what is it? How many companies have delisted from uh you know, London in the last couple years?
Another one bought out uh yesterday as well. Um a lot um I mean I wouldn't want to see that if I was running a country. Hi guys, it's Wolf. I hope you're enjoying this episode. Just a quick reminder to please hit follow or subscribe on your podcast or video app so that you never miss an episode. And if you've got time, please do give us a five-star rating and leave us a comment.
It really helps other people find the podcast, too. Now, back to the episode. Wanted to move on and talk about bureaucracy. Uh you've you've talked about how bad it was when you joined American Express with with Sandy uh Sandy while and and how you had to over You remember that? I do. I've I've read and listened to pretty much everything you've done the last couple years.
So, I have I've gone back over it all. And you now have 320,000 employees, more than you had then. So, just compare and contrast how you how what you found when you got there and how you avoid it today with with a massive company to try and make sure it's not, you know, sprouting up anywhere. Well, first of all, it does start at the top.
Not always, but it does start at the top. So I always say bureaucracy and and people people know bureaucracy see it. You could see it in how you fill out forms and taxes and department of motor vehicle and you know getting a certificate of occupancy for your house and people hate it. It's like demoralizing but but I always tell people that the scourge of any company big or small it's not unique to a big companies.
Maybe more unique is bureaucracy complacency and his cousin you know arrogance which is well of course you're doing well and that you're do well forever. But that's not true. You know, you can run a great restaurant, you have to do great service and great food every night. And you know, we're in the same boat.
We have to compete every day. And so, uh, the way you combat it is you you you're always an honest assessment of yourself. Not yourself as a person, but your products and services. You read customer complaints. You go to the call centers. You talk to your people all the time. You know, you're always finding out uh, you know, you're constantly assessing what's taking place out there, and you're relentless about it.
And you try to get your your you try to teach your your own team to do the same thing. That's that's why we have bus trips and road trips and there's not to show the flag. I want to hear we have the I always say we have these tellers and you know branch managers come on the bus we give them beer and immunity say whatever you want and I and I watch this sometimes where they tell me you know you know Jamie you really want that and like why we do this you know I remember the first time we did faxes for some product and they're they're just dumb things and people accept them and I'm like ah that's terrible we'll fix it for you.
I have seen people in my own management teams who were twisting in their chairs. They don't want to hear from someone layers down who report to them how bad it is, you know, and that tells me something about the manager too that you know they probably shouldn't have that kind of job or even have the job.
Uh if they can't acknowledge it because you don't know and then directly related to being is curiosity, always learning, always learning, always looking at competition, not so you can so you can compete. Acknowledge where you made mistakes, the good, the bad, the ugly. You know, there a lot of things that our competitors did that we could have done like Stripe and we simply didn't.
We missed it. Now, I don't say that to flagagillate myself or somebody else. I say it to be an honest assessment about well, yeah, we may have the biggest payment system in the world, but we missed that thing. And that thing is really big and really important and why. And you learn from why you learn from your mistakes.
And so, uh, you have a little heart and humility. You know, David Novak, who I think you know, you know, recognize people. And I I didn't always understand that recognizing people is a form of humility. and a form of curiosity because it's saying, "Hey, Wolf, you did a great job. We're going to recognize the job you did." It's also saying it wasn't me, it wasn't that person, it was you.
Then you recognize it. You know, you uh it it's uh we have those uh anonymous ways to give feedback at at Skype, but that you have to fill them on online and I always get nervous that is it totally anonymous, but I I'm I'm pretty blunt in those. So, I hope that I've always had that problem. And also when I turn my we you have to get a response.
I remember I first turned on bank one. It was so overwhelmed. I I closed it down with an apology. I'm sorry. And then we started to open it up by state just so we can handle it because it's disrespectful to say, you know, give me your input and then never get back to the person what that input might actually be.
And so I mean what you learn from it. It's it's funny you mentioned I still do that where I've asked them when I leave a lunch they mention eight things and I'm we're going to follow up every single eight. And you're you're you're also for someone in your position, you're very efficient at replying to your emails.
Yeah. Um which I find amazing actually given how uh how busy you must be. Um I've heard you talk when we talk more broadly about leadership uh about the importance of character many many times um across our interviews and and just publicly. And I had always sort of assumed in my mind that's a Jaime Diamond thing.
He puts character right at the top of his list when he's when he's trying to judge people. But I was recently reading my friend, your friend as well, Andrew Osawkins new book 1929. And I hadn't realized that it was also something that your founder does or did. Sorry. John John Pierre point Morgan that he put character above all else.
And this bubble's character. Yeah. And I I is that something therefore that you adopted having studied JP Morgan or or is it coincidence? It's coincidence. But I think a lot of people would say that's the highest thing. Now, you have to be honest what you mean by that because people, you know, a lot of these things people say the word, but they don't act on the word.
They put in jobs, but they say it's all about character. And you learn more as you get on like what it means. Like, would you promote someone to a big job that you wouldn't have your child report to? That tells you something about would you want to report to them, you know, and it tells you like how you make how actually you making those decisions, you know, if they're the best salesperson or something like that.
So no, but I brought back the the peer pun thing. So when I came, I saw that somewhere. I said, "Put that back." That's a that's a big thing, you know. Um, so we now use it as a as a a key point. And um, and it's also it's and it's really important in banking because, you know, in some ways we're like a financial partner.
I mean, it's not like you're just buying a piece of steel. You know, you you we we have to know, you know, how will you act in tough times? What kind of person are you? How do you treat your employees? all these little things that you wouldn't normally put on a credit form, but they're different forms of credit, you know, do you want to be a partner with that person?
Do you want to play on a team with them? I love team sports because you see when team sports when they are humming, man, they you see them working together. That's the form of character. They may not even like each other as opposed to another team where, you know, they hate each other and you can see that they, you know, they they won't pass the ball and
uh all these different forms of how you analyze these things. You mentioned David Novak there and I was listening to your appearance on his podcast a few years ago and you were talking about he was asking you uh given all the success that we've touched on like how how do you make sure you don't get a big head and I was really struck because almost counterintuitively you felt insecurity in CEOs is often what leads to to them having a big head or the appearance of a big head.
That's correct. So expand on that for me a bit. What do you mean by that? Yeah. I there's a great quote from John Weinberger in Goldman Sachs who said when some people get a big job some grow into it and some swell into it and what I've seen is that you know what happens the bigger job you get the less you know literally about the job so you're make believe you're in a train area and you run mortgages you're the best mortgage guy in the world you know more about mortgage than anybody else I have to call you up to find out about what's going on today in mortgages and stuff like that maybe that mortgage guy gets promoted to run trading now he's got equities commodities, fixed income, Asia, you know, and all of a sudden he's an expert in mort mortgages, but not in the other ones.
And then make believe you get the next job up. Now, now you've got 36 functions we're pointing to. You're an expert in one, and you kind of learn five, but all the others are foreign to you, and there are different people running these things. So, it it it induces insecurity. And what happens and I've just noticed this with people like some people when they get there they have these innate skills to trust people to get the best out of people to not get embarrassed by not knowing by having fun by being curious and saying god just do that again and let me know if I can help you with as opposed to uh and then the people when they have insecurities they tend to be like friends you know friends of Bob and you know don't he doesn't like that you know it becomes powerpoints you know make him look uh don't tell them the bad news and that is what causes the problem.
And you get that in governments too by with government leaders where you know they're surrounded by people telling them what want to hear because of insecurity. Whereas a secure person you you're not going to hurt my feelings by telling me we have a crappy product. I I would probably say, "Well, thank thank you." I'm going to go look because if you're right, I'm going to thank you for letting me know, you know, uh like I say, customer complaints are are a gift, you know, and when a customer complains, I people often say they're right or wrong.
I say, "No, no, look for where they might be partially right because very often there's a an element of truth that we should actually do something about even though in general they may not be right." So, I do think insecurity becomes one of those things and then you see the response to it is kind of covering up friends don't embarrass them.
you know, reports start being modified to look good as opposed to to undress what's going on in your company. Are you how are you performing with your seed score? What's your approval rates? What's your you know the all the stuff that a customer sees just it starts to disappear. And uh are we are we seeing some of that in the White House at the moment?
Don't tell them it's not good. I I'm not I can't comment on that. I'm not in the White House, so I don't And look, there's some very capable people I know there are and so you have to be in the room to find out what people actually doing. So, but but I think any leader should be worried about it. Yeah, it's just an ordinary course.
I know I I know we don't know and there's a lot of things that get exaggerated, but we do sometimes get to see inside the White House. Sometimes we have those cabinet meetings that are recorded. I mean, you know, be frank with us. If your board meetings were like that where everyone just said, "Jamie, you're so fantastic.
We love the job you're doing. You're the greatest CEO of all time." Would that be a good a good thing to have? I wouldn't mind having it every now and then. No. No. I uh I definitely do not have that. We definitely do not do that. Uh uh and we're So it's not ideal. It's not ideal. For me, it's not ideal.
I'm not commentating on the White House. For me, it's not ideal. And you know, I'm much more the good, the bad, the ugly. Uh you know, just trying to do the best job type thing. My board does something unique, by the way, which is every single board meeting I leave and they meet without me every for 20 years now.
And I and I insisted upon them. It wasn't legal. It wasn't regular. said because uh and then when there are disagreements with people, I say, "Okay, Wolf, you know, I'm I'm I tell B we're about to make a decision and Wolf just has a different point of view and I want you to hear it directly because again, I'm just trying to do the right thing.
I'm not trying to do the thing that I want to do. I want to do the right thing for the company, their clients or their products, their services." So, um there's another thing just to follow up on this theme. You you said this uh at Ohio State University commencement speech in 2021. You said, 'We all stand on the shoulders of those who came before us.
Humility is the realization that those who came before paved the way. Never fool yourself into thinking that your success is just your own. We just had the 250th. Do do you think that was enough on display? Uh that respect for the the 249 years beforehand, you know? Uh I it's hard for me to say like I do think you're it's absolutely right that we should have shown it.
I think a lot of things did. So if you were here there were documentaries, there were things on TV. There's a lot about Jefferson and Washington, Lincoln and Hamilton. And so I think there was some Was it enough is a very good question. I don't I think in general in America there's not enough. You know we have our constitution which is a legal document but what's really important is it's the embodiment of values and principles that that are more important.
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And some of these are British concepts by and the pursuit of happiness was was not happiness the way they mean it today's generation. It was pursuit of something meaningful, purposeful to you. It could be agriculture, could be it could be media, it could be education, it could be finance, something like that.
and and uh but then all the other principles, you know, freedom of speech and free religion, freedom of enterprise, uh uh to do what you want, you know, individualism, rugged individualism, uh work ethic, civic responsibility. So, if you read the founding fathers, that was all of it. We definitely do not teach enough that anymore.
And we definitely don't teach enough that those values are why billions of people would like to come to this country. Does that mean the country is perfect in its founding day? Of course not. I mean, do we spend a lot of time now talking about, you know, I heard one of our politicians talking about, you know, the company's country was founded on exploitation.
I mean, that's absurd. The person obviously doesn't understand anything. But did we treat the black community right? No. Should we acknowledge that and do something about it? Yes. But that doesn't mean that those principles were bad and that we shouldn't support it. And so, we're still the, you know, the the bastion of freedom in the world.
And so I I think we should support that, tell people that, educate people about that, and those other responsibilities are real. Like I think it's real for a business to get involved in making society better. I think it's a mistake for us to blindly look at the bottom 20% and act like we can't do anything to help.
Didn't cause it. I don't like it when people act like, you know, sometimes JP Morgan caused bad inner city schools. Really, that's I that just is not accurate. But can we help fix them? Absolutely we can. On the flip side, uh, in terms of respecting politicians, you you at the peak of the financial crisis, you sent Hank Pollson, former rival of yours, Goldman Sachs CEO, then had become Treasury Secretary.
He was under a lot of a lot a lot of stick at the time. And and you sent him the Teddy Roosevelt quote. It's not the critic that counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles. Uh the credit belongs to the man who's actually in the arena whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood whose strives violently and if he fails at least he fails while daring greatly.
With that in mind, do you have great sympathy for politicians? Yeah. So u yeah I do. You know I'm both mad at them and have sympathy. You know when we rolled out security resiliency in uh in London, you know what I said to the whole crowd to all Brits in the room? I said, 'We owe you all a great debt of gratitude for standing alone with 40,000 dead in in the battle of Britain, saving the world from that scourge of Nazism for a year and a half by yourselves uh and that is a debt of gratitude.
I think politics is a very tough game that and I think those who do it well and try to do it well and by and I was with David McCormack yesterday in Philadelphia rolling out some of these programs. The President Trump was there. That's maybe maybe we thought he was going to see the president and uh uh I greatly value the people who do that.
I love the fact he talks to his senator Federman the other senator from Pennsylvania over the time. And I think if you look at when I come here, I always remind myself there are a lot of people who want to do the right thing, who care about their country. They may disagree with you, by the way. Some may be more that, but I and I don't disrespect someone's got a different point of view about what might work out there.
But that doesn't mean you shouldn't get mad at the hypocrites, the liars, the bums, you know, the self-serving. And there's play of that, too. And if you read history books, there was there was play of that in the original Congress. You know, it wasn't just our Congress that has that. you you've obviously thought about politics at times.
Is it a problem that someone like you has ultimately never decided to do it? I guess the link to this question is how do you look at you meet with them all the time? H what's the caliber of G7 leaders today compared to you mentioned World War II there. You know the likes of church. Yeah. Well, I I didn't I can't compare them directly but um I I I first of all you make a point.
I think business leaders should get involved in trying to improve their countries and their societies because they have the knowhow, the knowledge, the capability. It kind of transcends a little bit just their commercial enterprise. But I also remind people that you know JP Morgan is not going to be a lot better in our country.
So if our country does really badly because we get all these policies wrong which we are getting wrong all the time now education policies certain tax policies you know certain immigration policies and all that that that if society does bail it it's bad for all of us in a million different ways and so and so a lot of these government people they want to do a good job and they need help and that's not an insult to them they they don't have the staff the world is very complex they often don't have the technology or the research capability or things like that so I when they I have good faith.
I want to do a good job with them. And so, look, I think, you know, I've met a lot of leaders in the world. And it's, you know, hard to measure a leader when you have, you know, 45 minute conversation with them. But some are quite exceptional. I mean, Mcronone is is exceptional, very smart, very dedicated, very knowledgeable, got a lot of great things done.
I know his polling, you know, I know that that's bad feels. Yeah. Yeah. But that's a poll. And you know, I think Storm is quite bright, you know, and um and I'm hoping, you know, that that these European leaders get together to form a coalition, the willing to start to make the change that Europe needs to make.
And uh I also think the business community can be a lot more organized in Europe that you need a you need a British roundt business roundt a stronger European that takes positions to that aid and abet the growth of their countries or EU in this case uh for the benefit of the people of those countries not for their own tax benefits you know and and so like I'll give you one the capital markets union the savings union you know it may sound boring to some of the population that could incent growth and if If you had it, it actually would be bad for JP Morgan because they'll be better competitors, but I know it's better for Europe.
I'm in favor of doing was better for Europe. That was better for JP Morgan and it'll make them better tougher competitors than the United States, but so be it. I mean, and too often business uses the regulatory legal stuff to actually block competitors. That's a bad idea, too. In many of our conversations, we've talked about, you know, what might happen uh if if you wanted to go into politics, and you've kind of ruled it out more clearly now.
Do you ever pause to think about the value you personally add to JP Morgan Chase? I mean, clearly, as we've already reflected on, you're not the founder, but do you accept that you have a founder-like effect on the company's performance, on the company's share price? You're not JP Morgan yourself, but you are Mr.
JPM Chase. I I I try to do the best I can. Yes. So every now and then I get called JP Diamond. But look, I'm not a I'm not a founder, but yes, I this is an unbelievable company. I'm proud to be here. Whenever I travel the world, I remind people we bank, cities, schools, states, hospitals. I'm really proud and and we try to do the best wherever we can.
We're respected most places. Uh and that that's a hell of a thing. And then I think this company also has great impact, positive impact on society, you know, through our skills effort and our hiring veterans efforts and our SRRI effort. And then we do much more you know than people don't see around you know policies and states and things like that.
So uh if you left what well one day I would be gone right like yeah but but if you left the company what would it do to the share price? 10% down on the day 20% down. I don't think so. I think it'll be different by the time I unless I'm hit by a bus but I think it'll be by the time it'll be you know probably organized thoughtful not not a surprising event for people.
So what what aspect of the way you run the bank do you think will be hard to emulate? I mean presumably you would accept that whoever succeeds you has to has to do it their way. They can't try and copy you. Of course they can't. We're all different you know and uh look I I would that's why I say you know someone asked me recently about that they said what what do you what are you looking for like what's strains like technology or AI and I just think that's a false thing to look at.
I think what you what you want is someone who's got work ethic, openness, curiosity, earns the trust of people, you know, can really work hard, can have empathy at a deep level and in many different ways, enough IQ to make sure the detail analysis done. They don't have to do it make sure it's done. So they have to be kind of disciplined like a little bit of a military discipline otherwise doesn't work.
But then those, you know, the heart I mean do you actually take care of people? Do they see you actually do? I fire customers who've treated our people really badly. I will not put up with that. And so, and that once you do something like that, filter through the company. We we, you know, we pay our lower paid people more to make up for their med for their medical insurance.
And we've hired 14,000 vets. Uh we try to be good citizens in every community we do business in. Uh and so we we're I want the heart, curiosity, grit. Like you better have you better have a little grit and a little bit of courage and you better be able to say no. Like because you know people say to me you've got 20 you got to decide by the end of the day.
I simple then the answer is no. I'm not going to be put put in a position you have to make a stupid decision quickly and so um uh but we have a lot of people have this wide bucket of skills and obviously their bucket will be different. How they execute them will be different but they have the skills.
Is [snorts] your successor definitely going to be Troy or Doug or could it still be Jen? Well, that's a I again I wouldn't say Troy and Doug obviously I've been put in a position where they're likely successors hit by the bus type of thing. You know, there could be somebody else there. You know, Jen has made it clear that that's her preference.
So, um and that's the other thing about the job. You know, I I tell people sometimes the close you get to it, the less they want it, right? I wanted to rewind the clock if I could to the 5th of March 2020. I I remember reporting on this day when it when it crossed. You you nearly died. you you suffered uh a a very a very nearly fatal heart failure but received sudden open heart heart heart surgery.
Did did your life flash before your eyes at that moment? Was it was it that close? Did you look back at JP Morgan Chase and what you built? Yeah, just, you know, that wasn't nearly as painful as the thing I went through earlier where your life slowly flashes through, which is the throat cancer and all the associated
radiation and chemo that would knocks the hell out of you. Um, no, I knew first I knew what it was, an aortic dissection. I knew that a lot of people don't even make it to the hospital, and I knew a lot of people get to the emergency room, don't make it out of the emergency room. So, I I knew at that point in time that, you know, there might be goodbye.
Yeah. and and what stood out for you in the life that you led in that moment. I remember uh that I spoke to my wife and I told her call their company and tell them exactly what's happening so they can do what they got to do. Um but I didn't the good news is I didn't I didn't have any great regrets. I I left was would be leaving behind great children, great wife, a great company.
You know, I did the best I can. Of course, I made mistakes. Uh I didn't think of that movie defending your life like they show you your stupidest mistakes on a screen and and uh but fortunately I recovered from all that. So, absolutely. Um I I guess on the topic though of uh of of family, I mean your job is relentlessly demanding.
How hard is it to balance family life at the same time? I am also relentlessly organized. I mean people would be surprised like I return every phone call every every day. My office is magnificent. They know all you. So half of that isn't me. It's like they're just responding. You want to know if you want come in town?
Will you do this? I go to Joe. They respond. So they they take care of the a lot of stuff like that. I and my calendar is I basically do work and personal life. So I don't you know I don't golf. I don't uh um I'm not I don't go to red carpets. I don't go to a lot of black ties. I don't go to you know I often meet the family for dinner on a Friday night.
All of them like the whole gang of them where we have a house in Bedford. We all go up there and basically barbecue or hike or swim or something like that. And so uh and that and we still do. We still take our family vacations. And so the kids I used to tell them like you know I did travel a lot. They were like you never traveled because they remember that I was devoted to them on most weekends even though I was gone some you know and we had a lot of family dinners.
They said a lot more than most people even though I was gone a lot but I was home you know. I was like okay I'm coming home. We're going to after dinner. Bring your friends. And when they're younger they and moan and complain but they love doing it. We still do it. M um and you know that's the best part of life.
My daughter, one of them said, "Dad, you you need you need another hobby. You need hobbies." I said, "What do you mean?" I said, "I I'd like and I'm not like into fast cars, per se, but I said I have I have you. We we eat together. We hike together. We travel together. I love history. I love wine. I love music." You know, I used to love tennis.
I can't play anymore because my back, but I said, "Those are my hobbies, you know, and I'm perfectly content with those. I'm not looking for other stuff." Um, I I've always heard you talk so so warmly and fondly about about your wife and and your kids. And um, I did want to pick up on this because I didn't know this beforehand.
Um, but your your dad would rip out pages of annual reports of companies and and hand it over to you and say, "Value this business. What would you pay for it?" I I didn't know that. So that's one of the the ways you got into this? No. My dad was a stock broker, so I was the of the three boys. He didn't push anyone that way.
My older brother was a physicist, a real class phys institute for years and my twin brother's an educator. Uh, so it wasn't anything but I was interested. I read the papers. I read Graham and Dodd in high school. I was a nerd. I read all of Freud's books in high school. I mean, I just always would like taking this stuff in and uh, but this is a great exercise.
You could still do this exercise and it's I still be humbled by it, which is back then annual reports were smaller. or you know they're yeah 40 page 30 pages long but there's always that part where told you the price of stock was and he would give it give me an industry you might know something about like a restaurant or something and say okay look at this look at the history read the annual report study the industry if you want what would you pay for the stock
it's hard it's it is brutally hard you know and then and then you learn also the why like uh you know the accounting is bad or the people are bad or there other there are other reasons people will not pay but you think oh it's worth 13 times earnings and the market has it at seven or or 25. And so it's it's humbling.
It's it's one of the many reasons I only did finance for 5 years and switched to media. I just have to comment on it now. I don't have to come up with the answer each each time. Um Jamie, we're basically out of time. So I just want to end with a question uh that we ask all our guests, you know, which is an overriding piece of advice for our listeners.
Often it's investment advice, but but for you perhaps better to ask, you know, the overriding piece of career advice for for for our listeners who are ambitious and hungry to to do well. Okay, I'll do the best I can. I mean, look, they're the basic work hard. But the ones that people miss a little bit, learn, learn, learn, learn, learn.
You can only learn two ways by reading. So, read a lot and read, you know, labor and uh conservative. Read Democrat and Republican. Read George Will and David Brooks and Tom Freriedman. Don't don't get button holed in your brain like uh to one thing. Read a lot of history. History itself turn teaches you a lot about what can go right what can go wrong what people do in tough times like Lincoln or Nelson Mandela how people misbehave in good times.
I mean and you read Andrew Rush Sawkins book you know they there are echoes of arrogance and leverage and greed and you do actually learn from that and you learn you can you can learn from other people's mistakes which is a better way to learn than making the same mistake and uh and then you learn with people and that's that's a better one and a harder one who are they like don't have a natural you know people are different than you they are smart a different way they're verbal they they're I mean there's one guy pointed out to me worked at bank one years ago and he said you know the guy's he was a sales guy in our one of our trading desks and he said that's one of the most decorated living American soldiers you know I didn't know you know and you learn all the time and a bus ask people about their past their histories you'd be shocked what they you know if they trust you and they open up to you and uh uh develop your EQs you know EQ is you know which you have in media but do do you have empathy do you understand when someone's hurting do you put your hand you know some people and have a bad day trading the boss puts his hand on and you know he's get out of here.
You know, the other boss might put his hand on and say, "It's okay. It happens to everybody. You know, go home and have a drink." And and so, um, you know, are you good at communicating? Like, you know, you know, Jeff Bezos has people write those six-page memos. A lot of people are sloppy as hell when it comes to communicating.
They'd rather just pontificate than say, "I have three things I want to describe you, A, B, and C, or three options, and and here's how I weigh the options. Here's why I pick B and not C." And then you have a conversation about it. And so um and that's a discipline by the way. Have some kind of discipline.
Oh, and a very important one. You have to take care of your mind, your body, your spirit, your soul, your friends, and your family. You should look at that as not a formal job, but it's part of what you should do. And you know, and you know, a lot of people, all of us, I look, I made a lot of these mistakes.
So this isn't saying I didn't make them, but hopefully you learn when you make them is that uh uh a lot of people they start their early careers, you know, they're under a lot of pressure. early career, they got married, they had kids, they and they start neglecting pieces, you know, and you know, sometimes like I tell some when I was younger, when I was younger and we all had young kids and some of the fathers were complaining, but they didn't have enough time for the kids.
Yeah. Yeah, but you go play golf every Saturday and Sunday. Stop playing golf. Stop watching three football games the weekends. You know, learn how to do what you should do.
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