JPMorgan

The JPMorgan credit derivatives trading farce is set to extend its run. Rival market players will have plenty of tactical opportunities for profits, but a bigger question for peer-group banks is whether they will be able to win back investment banking market share that was lost to JPMorgan after 2008.

Jamie Dimon’s failure to control the traders gone wild in JPMorgan’s chief investment office has dealt a serious blow to the standing of group CFO Doug Braunstein and investment bank head Jes Staley.

Fine line between hedge and prop trade; JPMorgan loses credibility

As JPMorgan's losses in credit derivatives are revealed, Euromoney columnist Jon Macaskill reveals just how the CIO division worked and the positions it took - and warns that other houses on Wall Street could try to make their rivals' losses worse.

Thanks to international expansion and infrastructure investment, revenue growth prospects at JPMorgan's Treasury and Security Services unit are bright, said Nomura analysts.

Media coverage of the staff in JPMorgan’s chief investment office turned up nuggets that ranged from the banal (credit derivatives trader Bruno Iksil has a penchant for wearing black jeans) to the comical (London head Achilles Macris had a picture of a missile on his apartment wall, in brave defiance of stereotypical assumptions about dealers).

JPMorgan still top earner; Nomura fee income falls by 34%

JPMorgan did a fine job in downplaying the significance of its recent payment of $153.6 million to the SEC to settle accusations of fraud over a mortgage-backed CDO squared product from 2007. The SEC had alleged that JPMorgan was negligent in failing to disclose the role that hedge fund Magnetar played in selecting the mortgages in the synthetic CDO, then taking the short side of the credit derivatives trades used to create the portfolio.

Chairman calls rules misconceived; Wants help against foreign competition

With a long-standing reputation for stability and sound advice, JPMorgan was ideally placed to profit from wealthy investors’ mistrust of other managers during last year’s market mayhem. Doug Wurth, head of its international private bank, tells Helen Avery how his division kept its cool and its clients during the crisis.

Revenues heavily weighted to OTC derivatives Worst-case guidance: JPM could face revenue loss of $3 billion a year

In most countries in Asia the larger local banks tend to dominate Euromoney’s best bank awards but it has been some years since that happened in Japan. Choosing a best bank in Japan has been a tricky business for some time. The three megabanks have had well-documented problems with weak balance sheets, unadventurous managers and poorly diversified strategies for the past decade. This year, two things have changed: the megabanks are in strong positions relative to their global peer group for once, and some of the smaller, more dynamic players, such as Shinsei, have been struggling.

At the turn of the century, a friend of mine was head-hunted by Morgan Stanley. He discussed his decision to change firms with me and I counselled him as follows: “Morgan Stanley is a good firm but it’s not the great firm it once was. The aura’s changed.” When pressed to expound, I said lamely that the calibre of people Stanley was hiring seemed to me more mediocre than in the past. Sadly, my friend took that as a personal insult and never spoke to me again.

Standard Chartered has gained management of the White Pine structured investment vehicle from JP Morgan Chase. The transfer, in addition to the Whistlejacket SIV, makes Standard one of the larger players. White Pine was established by Banc One by structured finance stalwart, Jim Irvine. Apparently an internal team led by Irvine also bid to take over management of the vehicle. This is a business where economies of scale matter. The size of White Pine is $8 billion while Whistlejacket has $6.5 billion. But Standard Chartered is still some way behind the largest SIV, Sigma, which has $30 billion under management.

The very richest clients of private banks are natural candidates for the services of investment banks. Hence the big banks' efforts to foster links across their own activities. Welcome to the world of the double-sided business card. Mark Brown reports.

Merrill Lynch has merged its high-grade and high-yield research teams. So has JP Morgan. They say it provides quality coverage, especially for fallen angels. But is it really just cost cutting in a bear market?

The success of Chase’s past merger ventures seemed to bode well for its link-up with JP Morgan. But those deals of the early 1990s had brought together commercial banks and didn’t have to reckon with integrating culturally alien investment bankers. On the execution front, the merger has proved messy, with blood-letting among JP Morganites in New York being matched by Chase losses in Europe. Beyond this – in itself enough to worry shareholders – there are concerns that underperforming JP Morgan was not the ideal medium for Chase’s equity market aspirations and that the deal was ill-timed, damaging Chase’s well-deserved reputation for clever risk-management skills in choppy markets.

Awards for Excellence 1997

Wall Street is competing with an 800-pound gorilla. That's the label attached to Chase as it wrestles investment banking mandates from traditional players. Even by US standards Chase is noted for being aggressive. And its great strength is the lending capability that helps it win both bond and M&A deals. Will it eventually be king? By Michelle Celarier.

This year, Euromoney's Awards for Excellence are broader in scope than ever before. A number of new categories have been introduced to reflect changes in the structure of international markets.