Government Gunning for JPM

heister:

ReadLine:

JPM is the most profitable bank in the US now. That must attract regulatory attention. And maybe there are good reasons for its profitability, even relative to its peers.

That plus it's initial hubris over the london whale incident and Dimon's outspoken brashness over capital reqs probably didn't go over well in washington. I remember a NYT piece earlier this year about JPM hiring new lobbyists and changing its tone to conciliatory in washington, guess it didn't work.

I'd say its a combination of deserving and piling-on.

Also- the Chinese hiring isn't about nepotism being illegal. It's doing it to foreign government officials that bring the problems. Corrupt Foreign Practices Act - pretty plainspoken law. One thing about the law is that it isn't a perfect synonym for fairness. Why else do tax attorneys make so much.

The entire idea behind that law is totally bogus. That is America sitting on its high horse and telling the world that you cant make bribes to get things done. When every day the government does the same thing. Think the corn-husker kickback. If America wants to outlaw bribes and kickbacks then the government needs to lead by example. Right now its do what I say not what I do. If China wants to do business in morally questionable ways with in its own country then who are we to tell them no? I would love it if America still had the walk with a big stick mentality, but the fact of the matter is we don't. We have leaders that don't have the personal will to stand behind what they said 5 min ago. Until we as a nation grow a pair and back up what we say with action at home, we don't have any right telling another sovereign nation how to handle its internal business practices. I realize that this is an American company they are going after over this and not China itself, but the message they are conveying to China is. Stop these practices or else American companies will not be able to do business with you.

The corn-husker kick-back was removed from the Healthcare Law before it was passed. Scalia didn't even know this during the Supreme Court arguments on Obamacare, which was embarrassing.

JPM is getting a ton of attention because they do a ton of shit that ends in them dropping literally hundreds of millions of dollars on legal fees and settlements every single year. Obviously, they aren't alone in this, but let's not all act like they've done nothing wrong.

Lastly - two wrongs don't make a right, bruh.

heister:

ReadLine:

JPM is the most profitable bank in the US now. That must attract regulatory attention. And maybe there are good reasons for its profitability, even relative to its peers.

That plus it's initial hubris over the london whale incident and Dimon's outspoken brashness over capital reqs probably didn't go over well in washington. I remember a NYT piece earlier this year about JPM hiring new lobbyists and changing its tone to conciliatory in washington, guess it didn't work.

I'd say its a combination of deserving and piling-on.

Also- the Chinese hiring isn't about nepotism being illegal. It's doing it to foreign government officials that bring the problems. Corrupt Foreign Practices Act - pretty plainspoken law. One thing about the law is that it isn't a perfect synonym for fairness. Why else do tax attorneys make so much.

The entire idea behind that law is totally bogus. That is America sitting on its high horse and telling the world that you cant make bribes to get things done. When every day the government does the same thing. Think the corn-husker kickback. If America wants to outlaw bribes and kickbacks then the government needs to lead by example. Right now its do what I say not what I do. If China wants to do business in morally questionable ways with in its own country then who are we to tell them no? I would love it if America still had the walk with a big stick mentality, but the fact of the matter is we don't. We have leaders that don't have the personal will to stand behind what they said 5 min ago. Until we as a nation grow a pair and back up what we say with action at home, we don't have any right telling another sovereign nation how to handle its internal business practices. I realize that this is an American company they are going after over this and not China itself, but the message they are conveying to China is. Stop these practices or else American companies will not be able to do business with you.

You missed the point. The Act is not aimed at telling foreign governments how to act. By the 1950s BLATANT corporate bribery over government contracts were pretty much wiped out. But after Nixon opened Chinese trade there was a lot of hoopla between american companies engaging a Chinese government that was all too willing to play corruptly. The idea of the Act is ensuring fair competition between American companies abroad.

And you have to make a major distinction between types of bribery. You've implied many different apples and oranges in this thread. You can' t just lump it together. For one thing- bribery within the private sector is perfectly legal. But if infrastructure business belonging to millions (or billions) of citizens is essentially co-opted for such a trivial favor like an enty-level job offer to someone's kid then that's certainly quite different, no?

That said- I agree bribery loopholes exist within the U.S. Which is why I said earlier that the law is not a synonym for fairness. It's a crude proxy at best. But that doesn't mean we should wipe it out and openly allow crooked practices.