Chilling Thing Jamie Dimon just Said about the Economy
by Wolf Richter
WolfStreet.com
January 14, 2016
JP Morgan Chase is a money-making machine. Profits in the fourth quarter rose 10% to $5.4 billion, bringing the total for 2015 to a record $24.4 billion. But it was a mixed bag of the good, the bad, and the rotting – of the type we haven’t seen in six years.
So revenues fell 2% for the year (under GAAP), which is to be expected, given that revenues of S&P 500 companies have fallen for four quarters in a row, according to FactSet. It’s been the worst revenue recession since 2009. It’s tough out there.
Total assets at the bank fell 3% to $2.35 trillion during the quarter, which CFO Marianne Lake explained this way during the earnings call this morning (transcript via Seeking Alpha): “The balance sheet was down in part purposefully and a little bit because of market conditions at the year end.”
But JP Morgan did what American companies do so well: it cut costs to more than make up for the revenue declines.
This cost cutting included over 5,000 layoffs across its four major business units – corporate and investment banking, consumer and community banking, asset management and commercial banking – with the first 1,000 folks already gone by May 2015 when the layoffs were first reported. At the time, the bank announced it would also overhaul its 5,000-plus branches, with technology replacing some humans.
The Rest…HERE
