“'They’re jealous,'” former Bear Stearns CEO Jimmy Cayne says about Dimon’s critics, in a rare interview since JPMorgan bought the foundering investment bank in March 2008. “’They’re looking at themselves as being unfortunate and being underpaid and being underappreciated, and if there’s a piñata out there to take a swipe at, who better than somebody who’s got everything that they don’t?'” [BusinessWeek]
[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]
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: