Jamie Dimon says JPMorgan is likely to outlast China’s Communist Party

JPMorgan Chase Chief Executive Jamie Dimon quipped that his bank is likely to outlast China’s Communist Party, while reiterating his company’s commitment to doing business in the country.

“The Communist Party is celebrating its 100th year — so is JPMorgan,” Dimon said Tuesday at a panel discussion at the Boston College Chief Executives Club. “I’d make a bet we last longer.” 

JPMorgan has been operating in China since 1921, the same year the Communist Party was founded there. Dimon said he wouldn’t be able to joke about outlasting the party if he were in China, but added that officials there were probably listening to his remarks in Boston anyway. 

Key Speakers At The IIF Annual Membership Meeting
Jamie Dimon, chief executive officer of JPMorgan Chase & Co., speaks during the Institute of International Finance (IIF) annual membership meeting in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, Oct. 18, 2019. The meeting explores the latest issues facing the financial services industry and global economy today. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg

The business community should have taken issues related to China more seriously a decade ago, Dimon said, citing trade tensions and the crackdown in Hong Kong. Still, JPMorgan can’t go in and out of countries every time it doesn’t like its policies, he said, noting that the biggest U.S. bank also has a presence in Russia, Pakistan and Egypt.

Earlier this year, JPMorgan won approval from Chinese regulators to fully own its China securities venture — a sign that U.S. financial firms are forging ahead with plans to expand in the country despite tensions between the world’s two largest economies. 

Dimon has called China one of the biggest opportunities in the world for JPMorgan. He visited Hong Kong last week after being granted an exemption from the city’s COVID rules, saying after he arrived that he was “not swayed by geopolitical winds.” 

In the interview, Dimon also said:

While it’s “too late now” for him to get into politics, he might have considered that route 10 years ago had he known what the political situation was going to be like.

Blockchain technology is “real” and useful for some banking tasks, but it takes too long and is too expensive for others. Tokens, on the other hand, have no intrinsic value, he said. “Buyer beware,” Dimon said, echoing his longstanding skepticism about cryptocurrencies.

U.S. policy is critical for the rest of the world to solve its problems, including climate change. But “if America is discombobulated,” the result will be global chaos.

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