Taking Chairman Title Away From Jamie Dimon Is The Craziest God Damn Thing Ken Langone's Heard Today

As you may have heard, recently some JP Morgan shareholders have been making a lot of noise about their desire to strip Jamie Dimon of his gig as JP Morgan Chairman. Their argument centers largely on last summer's incident in which one of the bank's employees lost $6+ billion on a trade. So far the board has rallied behind JD, but we hadn't yet heard from veterans of the business community. What, for instance, is Ken Langone's reaction to the idea that Jamie can't hold down two jobs at the same time? Whattayanuts? It's horse shit, is what! "Nuts!" he told Bloomberg TV the afternoon. "It's nuts!" 1. Jamie Dimon is the best CEO in America, nay, the universe 2. JPMorgan is so good is can afford things like the Whale. 3. Ken loves Jamie, as a human. 4 This "whole nonsense about governance is a lot of horse feathers" to Big Langs and 5. Unrelated but important: Ken Langone would like to remind you that he once vanquished Eliot Spitzer.

Author:
Bess Levin
Updated:
Jan 14, 2019
Original:
Apr 26, 2013

As you may have heard, recently some JP Morgan shareholders have been making a lot of noise about their desire to strip Jamie Dimon of his gig as JP Morgan Chairman. Their argument centers largely on last summer's incident in which one of the bank's employees lost $6+ billion on a trade. So far the board has rallied behind JD, but until today, we hadn't what veterans of the business community thought of the matter.

What, for instance, is Ken Langone's reaction to the idea that Jamie can't hold down two jobs at the same time? It's horse shit, is what!

"Nuts!" he told Bloomberg TV the afternoon. "It's nuts!" 1. Jamie Dimon is the best CEO in America, nay, the universe 2. JPMorgan is so good is can afford things like the Whale. 3. Ken loves Jamie, as a human. 4. This "whole nonsense about governance is a lot of horse feathers" to Big Langs and 5. Unrelated but important: Ken Langone would like to remind you that he once vanquished Eliot Spitzer.

Stripping Dimon of Chairman Title Is ‘Nuts,’ Langone Says [Bloomberg]
Langone, Farley On Dimon's Role At JP Morgan [Bloomberg TV]
The Many Loves Of Ken Langone [The Market Now]

The JP Morgan chief is worried the senator is missing some key points.

Mike Mayo: I think what I hear UBS saying in their presentation is, if I'm an affluent customer, I'll feel a lot better going to UBS if they have a 13 percent capital ratio than another big bank with a 10 percent ratio, do you agree with that or disagree? Jamie Dimon: So you would go to UBS and not JPMorgan? Mike Mayo: I didn't say that, that's their argument. Jamie Dimon: That's why I'm richer than you.

We* don't really find it particularly amusing amusing or post-worthy that a Jefferies employee accidentally or misguidedly put Jamie Dimon on an email about a working group list but judging by the number of people who've sent it to us, this is the height of banking humor, so here you go:

[caption id="attachment_73269" align="alignright" width="260" caption="People who *can* dance"][/caption] There are a lot of things Jamie Dimon is very, very good at: building a fortress balance sheet, chatting up reporters in elevators, doing sake bombs, and being appreciably better looking than his peers, to name just a few. In other areas, the JPMorgan CEO has left room for improvement. For example, his dancing skills, about which Dimon's own wife and mother are unsparing in their directness at this point. JPMorgan Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon “is a terrible dancer,” his wife, Judy Dimon, said last night at a gala for Ballet Hispanico, of which JPMorgan was the lead sponsor. She then moved her shoulders straight up and down to demonstrate what the 56 year-old leader of the biggest US bank, with $2.27 trillion of assets at year-end, does on the dance floor. Jame Dimon's mom, Themis Dimon, was no more encouraging. Is he a good dancer? "No," she said, shaking her head. Jamie Dimon wasn't present to prove otherwise. “Unfortunately he couldn’t be here tonight because he had another commitment,” said his wife, a Ballet Hispanico board member and the event’s honorary chairman. Too bad. Jamie Dimon missed a good party. His wife, in a slim-fitting coral gown, danced a salsa with New York Giants wide receiver Victor Cruz, reminiscent of his moves in the end zone after scoring a touchdown. Speaking of people who can hold their own on the dance floor? “We like to dance,” Jamie Dimon's father Theodore Dimon, there with his wife and Jamie's twin brother, told Bloomberg. “We dance the fox trot -- it’s nice and easy.” Scene Last Night: Victor Cruz, Dimon for Ballet Hispanico [Bloomberg]

Back in October, the most wonderful aspect of the JPMorgan Whale Tale emerged in the pages of Vanity Fair: the day Vice-Chairman Jimmy Lee barricaded himself in his office determined to come up with a way to help Jamie Dimon, and after hours of thinking real hard, summoned his six secretaries and told them they had a job to do, which was getting Tom Brady on the horn so he could deliver a pep talk sure to cheer up the boss. Was the call kind of awkward, considering the two had never spoken and Brady's lack of useful investment ideas likely meant his big speech involved not much more than "Even Super Bowl champion quarterbacks have bad days" and "Keep your chin up out there?" Probably. And yet some sort of bond was clearly forged, which would explain why Dimon felt compelled to throw Brady this bone:

He's got this. JPMorgan Chase Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon has the experience needed to manage the fallout from trading losses, and market disruptions haven’t been serious, Bank of America CEO Brian T. Moynihan said today. Trading didn’t freeze and markets behaved “reasonably well” given the circumstances after Dimon disclosed at least $2 billion in trading losses at JPMorgan’s chief investment office, Moynihan said today at a Manhattan investor conference. Dimon has shown he’s got the skills to handle the affair, said Moynihan, whose Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank ranks second by assets behind New York-based JPMorgan. [Bloomberg]

The JP Morgan CEO has taken a vow of silence.

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