David i dont consider myself a journalist. And nobody else would consider myself a journalist. I began to take on the life of being an interviewer even though i have a day job running a private equity firm. How do you define leadership . What is it that makes somebody tick . Jamie, lets talk about your background a moment. You started out, your father was a stockbroker, and you started out with some background in this area, but did you ever consider going into banking . Was that always what you wanted to do when you went to Harvard Business go . Jamie no. I knew more what i didnt want to do. I didnt want to be a doctor or lawyer. I wanted to be part of building something. I grew up around stockbrokers and wall street and stuff like that. And my dad, who passed away recently gave me you should try this one they take an annual report, get the end of year report, rip out the price, analyze it, and you will be humbled, immediately. Do it a couple of times. I was always in the financial world, so i went to business school. I didnt have to go to the financial world. It is fascinating. Everything you read in the paper mattered. They are global. You get involved in so many policy issues. It was just a fun place to build. I would have had just as much fun building something else. David normally if you go to Harvard Business school, you can go anywhere you want. You could have gone to Goldman Sachs, a great firm. You chose to go to work for sandy why did you do that . Jamie i found that he was down to earth. He offered me to go to an Investment Bank. I said, no. I had offers from Goldman Sachs and lehman. I said i would learn more at these other places. They eventually called me up, kind of like me, and he said, why dont you come be my assistant . You will learn a lot. I do not know what is going to happen. He lasted there about three more years. David you did learn a lot. When he left jamie i left with him. I was offered a bunch of jobs to stay, but he said, we will find something, build something great. We took over this Little Company called commercial credit, in baltimore here. I moved down here. And we took these little companies, it had seven other little companies, including a company in israel, a small international bank, propertycasualty company, a small Life Insurance company, and that company is the same company that became citi. And over those 12 years, so these names you will recognize, shearson, salomon brothers, travelers live, travelers propertycasualty and it was a conglomerate. We did a good job with shareholders and merged with citi. And it was a hell of a run, and then he fired me. [laughter] david so what jamie when he did that, a year later i called them up. I called him. He didnt call me. Just a you know i said, sandy, it is time to break bread. We met at the four seasons restaurant. I wanted to do it privately. It was on the front page of the ft. Dimon have lunch. And there was civil war in china. Anyway, he was a little nervous. And i said, we are not going to spend time in the past. All i will say is, you did the wrong thing for the company. I made a lot of mistakes too, and here are some of the mistakes i made. After i gave him the mistakes i made, he said, thank you for sharing that with me. We had a very nice lunch. Its not quite clear that he did the wrong thing for the company. Life goes on. David so, you were in a small office, as i recall it, at the seagrams building. Jamie after i got fired come you mean. David you had a small office. Jamie this shows you how stupid Corporate America gets the company had been set up. We had a cochairman and coceo. I was going to be the president and run the Global Corporate Investment Bank and other jobs. Because those turmoil among management deals are very tough, we had cheads of asset management, consumer and technology reported to me. Instead, all of the staff was reporting to sandy and john. When they did that, i said, you guys are crazy. This will destroy the company. The second you do this, people will build trenches and stockpile ammunition. And by the time you two guys figured out, a lot of good people had left the company, not realizing i would be the first casualty, by the way. They were saying, it works for me. I kept saying, it does not matter if it works for you. It matters if it works for the clients and employees. It works for me. So when you hear a ceo say, it works for me, you should question their intelligence a little bit, because it is not the way you should look at business. It is what works for the client ultimately. David when you were fired and were looking for something to do, you had a lot of jobs. I think you are offered the ceo of home depot . Jamie home depot, a couple of Big International Investment Banks. Not to run the parent company, but to run the Investment Bank. Hank greenberg who ran aig said, why dont you come over here . All i could think to myself was, to go from sandy to greenberg, you would have to have your head checked. [laughter] jamie a bunch of private equity folks. Jeff bezos was looking for a president. I love the guy and we have been friends ever since. I was thinking, i would never have to wear a suit again. I am going to get one of those houseboats in seattle. I loved what he did. It was beyond i spent my whole life in financial services. It is like playing tennis your whole life, then going to play golf. I love the guys at home depot. I went down to have dinner with bernie marcus, arthur blank, and kim langone. I said, i have to confess to you guys. Until you called me up, i have never been in a home depot. A guy who i worked with said, jamie, you have to go to one before you go to the dinner. [laughter] jamie they did not care. They said, we want you the person. We are looking for the heart, mind, and spirit. A couple of other internet companies. You make a billion dollars type of thing. I figured this is my chance. How many major Financial Companies are there . 30 . How many of them have changed ceos in a fouryear period. So i said this is my commercial credit. I put a lot of my money into it, and the stock was cheap. And i thought, you know what i look at business as i wear the jersey, i am not a hired gun. Ok . I believe in the company and it will give everything i got. I do not want to hand it over to somebody else. It is not a thirdparty to me. This is what i do. David so when you went to bank one, didnt you ever expect you would move back to new york, or you thought you were going to chicago and that would be your career . Jamie i had no idea. I love chicago by the way. It is a great city. And i really didnt know. There is a cartoon of me sitting at an airport and the person saying to me, mr. Dimon, there are no scheduled flights to new york. [laughter] jamie when i go to chicago, they did not believe i was going to move here. Are you moving here . Are your kids going to school here . I said, yes, im staying here. And i tell them in chicago, if i die in chicago and they ship my ashes back to new york, they would say, i told you. [laughter] jamie i did not know. I thought, remember the Banking Industry was consolidating. It is still consolidating, so i knew if i did a good job, i would be part of that. But i did not know i would be an acquirer, building up a bigger regional bank. It is not up to me. It is also up to a board of directors. You make a company as good as you can and that creates all the opportunities you have. David would you say right now that the u. S. Economy is in reasonable shape . Jamie america has the best hand ever dealt of any country on this planet, ever. David what would you advise to get the economy growing at a better clip . Jamie so there are serious issues the country has, and they are not republican or democrat. They are not left or right. They are the issues we talk about, know about. So immigration is something i have spent a lot of time on. Innercity School Education is a disgrace. We should be ringing an alarm bell. Over 50 of the kids in the innercity schools did not graduate. And even those who do are not qualified to have a job. Those who create jobs should Work Together to make sure that certificates, high school, vocational, community college, or college, ends up with a job. Not just that we have more tax reform. We are driving American Capital and American Businesses overseas every day. This inversion problem is making it advantageous, believe it or not, for Foreign Companies to buy a american companies, for Foreign Companies to invest here, so it is a little more complicated. And so i also agree you would not have Corporate Tax reform without individual, and i would propose Something Like a greatly expanded earned income tax credit. You read about infrastructure. The democrats are right, we need more infrastructure. Your are talking about 150 billion a year, a drop in the bucket. Im talking about transportation, tunnels, bridges, roads, airports. The democrats are right, and theyre afraid of raising taxes to do more spending. They hear that great sucking sound in washington. This is a Perfect Place to get people in the room. Ask of the republicans, how can we do this in a way that you can approve it so that we are building bridges that we actually need. I believe the president took care of all those things. The economy could be booming. If the president , not democrat or republican, we would be booming. We are not booming because of all the issues we selfcreated that have slowed down growth. It is time for them to do something. And by the way, wages, growth will fix wage inequality. And study show that cutting Corporate Taxes will help wage inequality, make it better, so we should be thoughtful about policy and get it right and not over politicize. We really damage ourselves when we do that. David you come to washington from time to time to meet legislators and regulators. What kind of experience is that for you . [laughter] jamie first of all, i think it is important that business get involved in washington, so i am not a person who says you never go there. You know, policy is set here. There are a lot of people who really do care about making it a better country, and if you dont get involved, that means you will be separate from other people. Obviously the Regulatory Environment for banks, not just for us. I travel the United States, and when i go to people, groups like this, in any city, i get an earfull about regulations. I think there is a serious issue about diminishing a little bit the Regulatory Burden on people and the economy. But i do the best i can. That is my job. To deal with regulators and policy issues. I also think that when you come down as a business person, the interest of the country should be put before the interest of your industry or company. And so businesses are constantly asking for that one little thing to help them. [applause] jamie i hear these horror stories. You know, just do it is right for the country and your business will be fine. And in fact, your business will be better off of the country is strong. Business has to be careful. It is too selfserving. That does not appeal to the american public. That does not help politicians to get things done. That is what i am saying, earned income tax credit, taxing your carried interest of little bit those would be good things for america. [laughter] jamie we should do that and help them at the lower end with education, all those things we need, but have Corporate Tax reform. David the interview is over. [laughter] jamie you can afford it, david. Ok . [laughter] david on the economy, you get data from all over the world that j. P. Morgan gets. Would you say the u. S. Economy is in reasonable shape . Jamie when we look at the economy, i always look where are the potholes . We did see potholes in 2007, 2008 there are no real potholes there. I put it the other way around, america has the best hand ever dealt of any country on the planet today, ever. Ok . And americans dont fully appreciate what i have to say. We have peaceful, wonderful neighbors in canada and mexico. We have the biggest military berries ever built called the atlantic and the pacific. We have all the food, water, and energy will ever need. We have the best military on the planet, and we will for as long as we have the best economy. If you are a liberal, listen to me on that one, because the chinese would love to have our economy. We have the best universities on the planet. There are great ones elsewhere, but these are the best. We still educate most of the kids that start businesses around the world. We have a rule of law which is exceptional. If you dont believe me, and we are talking about britain, russia, brazil, argentina, china, india believe me, it is not quite there. We have a magnificent work ethic. We have innovation from the core of our bones. You can ask anyone in this room what we can do to be more productive. On factory floors, we do it. It is not just steve jobs. We have the widest and deepest Financial Markets the world has ever seen. Ok . And i just made a list of these things, and maybe i missed something. It is extraordinary. It is extraordinary. And we have it today. Yes, we have problems, but if you travel around the world get in an airplane and travel around the world and go to these other countries and tell me what you think. Go to europe. You want to talk about tough regulations and bad politics. We have it all. We just need to fix we have been shooting ourselves in the foot in my opinion. We have done a pretty good job shooting ourselves in the foot. [applause] david you would never consider running for office, would you . [laughter] jamie i would love to be president of the United States of america, and until donald trump got into office, i always said you would never have a rich businessman who has never been in politics be president , so i was clearly wrong about that. It is just too hard. I think most people, you need to be senator, governor. It is why Michael Bloomberg would be imminently qualified. Didnt do it. It is why i also think by the way this collaboration which you here today is, you know, get the experts out of the room. We have heard that before. We need policy, thoughtful people. We need analytics. We need it done right. We need to do it together. 145 Million People work in america, 125 million work for private enterprise. Ok . Government cant do these things by itself. And they act like government is the only solution. Im reminded of the post office, the department of motor vehicles. Matter of fact, the only thing they do really well is the United States military. [applause] jamie so collaboration works. If you go around the country, it works in all of these cities, all the states. It is here. For some reason, we just get bogged down and maybe it is just too complicated for mankind. David what is the greatest pleasure of doing this, running a bank . Jamie im not an artist, tennis player, musician, politician this is my contribution. David so, do you think the country is better off for having doddfrank now or not . Jamie look, the Banking System is far the Banking System is under enormous strain. J. P. Morgan, we do the stress tests. I am very much in favor of the stress tests. J. P. Morgan has 500 billion in capital today. That is enough to bear the losses of all 31 of the banks. All of them. The whole Banking System in america has recovered. Part of that is doddfrank. I dont know anyone who would agree with doddfrank. Barney frank and i agreed that some of the things put in there after the fact should not have been put in, but it is what it is. Unfortunately because doddfrank, well, volcker was one of them, but it is what it is. I have to deal with it. That is the law of the land. It has been interpreted. It is not a legislation that says x. It basically says make the system better, but the regulators have a huge amount of authority to interpret these rules. So the system is better. Doddfrank is partially responsible, but doddfrank was passed 100 democrat, 0 republicans. None of us can possibly say you cant make things a little bit better. So one day, people, rational people should sit down and say what parts work, what parts dont work, what should be changed. I am not in favor of throwing it out and started at ground zero. A lot of good work was done and and there were a lot of flaws that needed to be fixed. David you were quoted before the brexit vote as saying you would have to move people out of london. Any thoughts on what happened . Jamie brexit is what we expected. Brexit is a vote for the unknown that we thought would reduce the gdp of the u. K. It is going to. It is pretty much going to with foreign direct investment, people opening factories, construction. It is not a disaster. We think. 5 to 1 . That will reduce the gdp a little bit. Not a disaster. 3 . That is one thing that we know. The second, now we have this uncertainty, and it isnt going to go away because you will be reading for the next year or two years about all the complexity. And we dont know the outcome. So i usually look at best case, worst case. The best case it looks a lot like today. I give it only 10 . And they will not get away with that because the eurozone is angry and they are saying you were not have free access to our markets without Free Movement of people. That is exactly why people in britain voted against it, for brexit. I was not for it. There was logic for it. Their logic was why tether yourself to europe when brussels are passing europes that affect british citizens, and that was true. Maybe the eurozone will say, lets fix the problems for everybody, all 27 nations, not just britain. What worries me the most about brexit is that it causes the eurozone itself to unravel. You have elections in france and germany, so you dont know who the leadership is, populism. It is tough. And if you see the eurozone unravel, that has potential catastrophic issues associated with it. Maybe just a big recession. It could be worse than that. We know what that continent has been through for hundreds of years. To me, keeping the union together would be a better outcome. If they dont, we will deal with that too. But a better is that they have a stronger union, not a weaker union. David what about the banks in europe or china . Are you worried about the banks there . Jamie the banks in europe are way behind america. I say it with sympathy to them. Just like when i am talking about our peaceful neighbors and the pacific and atlantic, i remind people china does not have food, water, energy. Its neighbors or north korea, philippines, pakistan, russia, indonesia. Tough part of the world, folks. That changes peoples mindset when it comes to managing their country. So to europe is behind us. They still have not fixed their capital, their profitability. It is much more important to the Financial System in europe than it is here. It is 70 or 80 of the Financial System there. Here it is like 20 or 30 , but if i was running the european government, if you are a dictator, i would lay off at them at this point. Let them do their jobs. Pounding them eight years later is in my opinion causing europe to grow a lot slower than it would otherwise grow, because these banks are unwinding constantly, loans, issues, and credit. I dont want to see them hurt anymore. I would like to see them get strong. And in a healthy economy, if they need to add capital liquidity, do it then. In china, the four big banks earn twice as much as we do now. So i told american politician and im not saying it lightly that is my competition too. Some of them earned 40 billion a year. They may have problems with their loan books, but they are ambitious. Icbc bank is now in 60 countries. Chinese companies are going abroad, which i think is very smart. I think the chinese are quite smart in dealing with their situation. Their banks are banking abroad. They want their banks to be winners. They want the next j. P. Morgan chase the next one. I dont want them to have it. I think we should have it. They can buy us one day. We have to be very careful when we talk about American Business, what we want for American Business and how important it is for the success of america, and not just us. But a lot of these companies are in the same boat, ge and caterpillar. We have to compete with some tough competitors globally. David you have been running a bank, bank one and j. P. Morgan, for about 16 years, so what is the greatest pleasure of running a bank . Jamie this is my contribution to making it a better world, running a good j. P. Morgan chase. I tell people that if i dont do a good job for j. P. Morgan chase, i heard the opportunities for people. We cant be philanthropic. For people. We cant be philanthropic. If i do a good job, we can do all those things. Im not an artist. Im not a tennis player. Im not a musician. Im not a politician. This is my contribution. David jamie, i am sure your shareholders would be happy for you to stay forever, but you have any plans how long you will stay in this position . Jamie as long as i have the energy to do it. It takes a lot of energy. David your health is good . Jamie my health is good. Thank you. So as long as the board is happy with me. I always say five years. I will be 65. I do think there is a time when the right person is ready that i should leave. Maybe the board were asked me to be chairman for a year or two or Something Like that. I will have an afterlife. Like you, i am never going to stop working. I will go on a board, teach, do something to help the government somewhere. I will be fully engaged in business and stuff like that and also try to make it a better country. My wife is deeply involved in philanthropic she does inner city schools in the south bronx, trying to get those kids jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, and she is doing a great job of that, so i will probably help her with that and things like that. Today we made a woman who was forced to take over her business , with another death in the family. The tragedies have made her stronger, she now runs a multimillion dollar operation, with me as her
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