Anyone remember the spectacle of Jamie Dimon being called to account for the London Whale? Lawmakers sought a bit of camera time and figured a public thrashing of the JPMorgan boss over a rogue trader’s $2 billion loss (at the time) was a great way to do it.
Largely overlooked was the $19 billion in losses from the government’s bailout of the auto industry, reported just before the hearing. The latter was hailed as a success. Only in the absurd Beltway world would a $19 billion loss be a political positive, while a $2 billion loss cause for grave concern and partisan grandstanding, but so it is.
Get ready for more.
Prolific letter-writer and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, has penned another message, this time asking Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee Chairman Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, to throw Wells Fargo CEO Tim Sloan in the dock.
Not that we have much (check, any) sympathy for whatever stress the bank’s executives might be feeling, but as previously noted, how can the senator and her sycophants possibly make it better?
They can’t.
The public airing of Wells Fargo dirty—toxic, radioactive, hazmat—laundry is now a thing because of the market, not anything regulatory or sanction related. Indeed, the symbiotic back-scratching between Washington and Wall Street arguably made it worse.
We’re reminded on the moral panic in the wake of Madoff (and Lehman and Enron and WorldCom and …) to do something, anything, didn’t matter if it might make it worse. Few realize it was the market that exposed the massive fraud, not anything regulators or investigators did. Think the SEC “got” Madoff ? Here’s a refresher from hero Harry Markopolos, who busted Bernie with simple math.
Senators now seek to question Sloan and the Board about “new developments,” something completely superfluous, and will only hurt those (once again) they profess to help—Wells Fargo participants and shareholders.
With more than 20 years serving financial markets, John Sullivan is the former editor-in-chief of Investment Advisor magazine and retirement editor of ThinkAdvisor.com. Sullivan is also the former editor of Boomer Market Advisor and Bank Advisor magazines, and has a background in the insurance and investment industries in addition to his journalism roots.
I am sure I am not going to be the only one complaining about the title of your article….referring to Elizabeth Warren as being on the WARPATH! This reflects extreme bias in your reporting.
It’s an opinion piece, billed as such.
Ms. Warren is a menace to liberty in general and hostile to capitalism in particular, however the target of her wrath is not all that different. The spectacle of Mr. Dimon being hoisted on his own petard could be a semi-entertaining diversion from the unfolding disaster that now describes our once enviable republic.
I thought “warpath” was an appropriate
word for the author to use – didn’t Warren use her “Indian blood” to get reduced educational cost coverage for her
education?
Tongue in cheek ??
Maybe a ‘FORKED TONGUE,” but nothing that was inappropriate considering the subject of the piece offered up her heritage ( real or not ) as fair inclusions when characterizing her.