Jonathon Trugman

Jonathon Trugman

Business

How the US thanked Jamie Dimon

JPMorgan just got its first thank-you note for helping save the financial system five years ago.

It’s a strong-armed “settlement” that forces it to pony up $13 billion — $5.1 billion of which goes to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, it was announced late Friday — to the same government that asked for its help. And that just covers the civil end of things; the possibility of criminal charges remains.

CEO Jamie Dimon and JPMorgan’s board of directors went above and beyond the call of duty when the phone rang on two Saturdays during the 2008 financial crisis.

Dimon and his board were given 24 hours to put together a deal that would normally take a year for due diligence.

Let’s just say it’s not exactly an easy decision to say no when the Treasury secretary and the Fed chairman are breathing down your neck. Especially when both are also contending with the possibility that the ATMs would not work on Monday morning.

Dimon and his board of directors clearly had two principal things on their minds during this time of government-arranged deals: doing right by their country and doing right by their shareholders.

Both causes are perfectly noble.

The shotgun acquisitions of Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual that the feds orchestrated were massive and risky. So here’s the question: Why would the government turn around and prosecute a bank that helped save our financial system — at the government’s insistence, mind you — for the actions of the acquired players that necessitated the failing firms being taken over?

JPMorgan — and, for that matter, any bad actors from the mortgage crisis — should be held responsible for any wrongdoing that they committed, but not for what took place at Bear Stearns and WaMu before Dimon and JPM were in charge.

Whether you like Dimon or not, he and his board stepped up when their country called on them.

So if JPMorgan makes money on the deal, that’s good for America, because the company pays taxes on profits and it saved jobs.