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Zanny Minton Beddoes: Hello everybody, welcome to this session. Jamie Dimon, a man who needs no introduction. Arguably the most successful banker of our era. You've built over the last 20 years, JPMorgan into a bank that stands out as big as the next three US banks combined. In those 20 years geopolitics has changed dramatically, economic policy has changed, technology has changed. And I want to get to all of those, but let's first start with what was the secret, very briefly, what's the single most important thing that you did to be so successful at JPMorgan?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: First of all, welcome everybody, thrilled to be here. Look, I made a lot of mistakes. I don't want to echo the secret sauce. Relentless, grit, attention to details, admit your flaws quick. Problems don't age well, reverse course when you're wrong, get great people, let them do their jobs.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Very easy to do. What do you wish you'd done differently?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: If I look back at mistakes I made, and you've heard this from other CEOs, its already too late. You waited too long. You put up with too much bureaucracy or something like that. And then the other thing is not seeing people’s mistakes. Taking too long to recognize mistakes and that takes a long time to fix or something that. Other decisions that we lost money or something, I don't worry that much about that. But those are the two main flaws, I guess.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: It's interesting, saying you waited too long. Let's talk about that in the context of the huge technological revolution we're in the middle of with AI, because you are spending very big on technology, and you've been very aggressive. Can you talk me through how you're thinking about AI and how you are positioning JPMorgan and what you are doing?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: We don't look at AI as a different technology. Technology has always been the thing that changes everything we all do. That's been true my whole life, my whole career. So, we've always had the head of technology at the management table. And we do different kinds of business review. We ask, “What are you doing in tech?” And it could be for finance or HR. “How are you gonna improve your ops?” “What are you doing what's better?” “What do other people do?”
AI works closely with tech but now it has its own seat at the table. And so whenever we meet, there's a list of AI questions. So, for any one of you, if you work with JP Morgan, you have your list of what is being done in AI, what is being implemented. It could be coding, it could be open AI, it could be limited systems. We have 500 use cases, and you got to get better at it. It's very fast, it's changing rapidly. We have an LLM where 150,000 people use that internal data every week. You just got to make it part of your psyche. I still think it's the tip of the iceberg. I think this one is faster, its massive, it is like the internet. Or electricity. It is not going to roll out over 20 years. It's more parabolic for now.
I still think it's the tip of the iceberg. I think this one is faster, its massive, it is like the internet. Or electricity. It is not going to roll out over 20 years. It's more parabolic for now.
”Zanny Minton Beddoes: When you think about the impact of AI, do you think of it as being an efficiency improver? Are you looking at how we can improve things across all of these business units? Or are you thinking that this is going to reinvent what JPMorgan is at a much more fundamental level?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I think it could be both. To help do things better, faster, quicker, more proper. We have use cases: Risk, fraud, marketing, errors, customer service, idea generation, hedging, credit. It's used extensively. But I do think if you take it to the next step – with AI agents – that could change your business. The speed at which things happen, how people access our systems. That is true for the technology. Remember, in the old days, 40 years ago, you called up to do a stock trade. Now you do it on your iPad and you enter it and it goes through algorithms and it gets executed automatically. So, it will change the way customers face us. We have to be very adept at saying “What do you want? You're the customer, how do you wanna access it?” And so yeah, I think it'll change a bunch. It may lead to us winning and losing in big areas.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: I think it poses a threat to incumbents more. Are you more worried about new fintechs becoming much more adept at this than you were before?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: This is very important. If you go back 20 years ago, our competitors were Goldman and Wells and Bank of America. As you see, they're all doing well now, all of them. But now we have Stripe and PayPal and Chime and SoFi Revolut – these are great companies and they're coming at you, some to pick a sliver of the business, some to take your whole business. So yeah, I think you have to look at all of that and if you put your head in the sand, you will lose. I think that was true 30 years ago, but I think it's probably truer today. And the brain power and money that's going into this thing is extraordinary. And so, if we don't do our job faster, quicker, yeah, we'll lose, too.
If you put your head in the sand, you will lose. I think that was true 30 years ago, but I think it's probably truer today.
”Zanny Minton Beddoes: And when you take the experience you've had at JPMorgan, what does it make you think about the impact across the economy? Are you in the camp that, say half of all entry-level white-collar jobs will be gone in one to five years? Do you think it is going to have a kind of cataclysmic impact on the labor market?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Yeah, I don't know about that. As a business person, my view is don't put your head in the sand. It is what it is. We're going to deploy it. Will it eliminate jobs? Yes. Will it change jobs? Yes. Will it add some jobs? Probably. It is what it, is. You can hope for the world you want, but you're gonna get the world that you got and your competitors are gonna use it and countries are gonna use it. However, I do think it may go too fast for society. And if it goes too fast, for society, that's where government and business must step in together. We must come up with a way to retrain people or move it over time. Trade Adjustment Assistance was supposed to do that. If a town loses a factory and they lose jobs, you have income assistance, relocation, early retirement, retraining. We may have to do that. And I think we're doing it ourselves.
It is what it, is. Fwh
”Zanny Minton Beddoes: That wasn't exactly a great success.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase In the USA it was incredibly poorly done. It did not work. We need to be prepared to have something that works this time.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: But given the speed at which this is happening, and this is, I'm not so much talking about JPMorgan, I'm talking in public policy terms. Given the speed at which this technology is coming: What do governments, the US government and other governments need to be doing right now to prepare societies for that?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Have plan to retrain people, relocate people, income assist people. I'll give you a thought exercise. There are 2 million commercial trucks in the United States. With AI, it may get to the point where you can push a button to runk trucks. This will help you save lives, make things faster, save CO2, it obviously makes sense. And should you do it all at once if 2 million people go from driving a truck making $150,000 a year to a next job that might be $25,000? No. You'll have civil unrest. So therefore, phase it in.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: How can you phase it in AI?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Just tell them you can't layoff 2 million truckers tomorrow. You can phase it in over time.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: You want the government to tell you you can't lay off a whole bunch of people at JP Morgan?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: We would agree. If we have to do that to save society, remember, it'll be a more productive society. So, society will have more production, we're gonna cure a lot of cancers, you're not gonna slow it down. How do you have plans in place to make it work better if in fact it does something terrible? And that's the only way to do it.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: And that should be done at the level of the government telling companies they cannot lay off people?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase No, I think it should be done at more of a local level, where someone says to a JP Morgan: put your incentives to put in place to retrain these people. Can you slow this down and give people income assistance? Yeah, we could do stuff like that. We're not going to kill all of our employees tomorrow because of AI. We just are not like that.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Absent that, in five years time, will JP Morgan have fewer employees than it has now?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase Well, if we're good, we'll have, you know, we're growing still around the world. But my guess is there'll be fewer employees, yeah.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: In five years. So, AI, the technological revolution, is one of the huge changes we're living through. We're also living through a very dramatic geopolitical shift. The word Greenland keeps coming up here. Before we get to Greenland itself, more broadly, you've written in shareholder letters over the years about the importance of geopolitics. You've worried about geopolitics in previous years. How dangerous is this particular geopolitical moment? Is it the most dangerous you've seen?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Look, I think it's cumulative. I think the world after the invasion of Ukraine – and by 300,000 Russian troops – people wake up. We thought the world was safe. It's simply not safe. And so, what I want is a stronger NATO. I think we need a stronger NATO. I think it is right for us to complain that NATO didn't do enough. Fine, got it. Crying over spilled milk, how do you make it stronger?
I think we need a stronger Europe, I think that's good for America, it's good for Europe. They know what they need to do. The Draghi Report, all these common markets and savings and investment policies – they don't have that common market yet. They have too much bureaucracy, too many things get in the way. That would be good for Europe and very good for America. And you know, trade and tariffs are part of that, but not the only part of it. So, I still think that is the best thing to keep the Western world together. That would be my goal. Make the world safer and stronger for democracy so that we don't read that book 40 years from now: How the West Lost.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Do you think the Trump administration is making the world safer and stronger and making NATO stronger?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I don't think it's a binary thing. To identify what NATO weaknesses are, I mean, that's fine. They do it their own way. I wouldn't say things like that on TV, I might say it privately. So, I think it is okay to point out, I would be more polite about it, about the weaknesses of Europe, what they need to do. But if the goal is to make them stronger as opposed to fragment Europe, then I think that's OK.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Do you think that is the goal?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I have not heard them say what they want the ultimate goal to be. But remember, we did not leave NATO. To me, it's important to understand that originally, during Trump one, people were looking to leave. We didn't. And he's out there in the world. And you may not agree with it all, but it's not a treaty on America of some sort. And so, I think the economic side is more complicated because it entails detailed policy that needs to get done. If I was there, I would be using our moral persuasion, our economics persuasion or intelligence and military to push Europe to do the things that's right for Europe. And the leadership of Europe have to do it. It really can't be done by America, but we could be a partner maybe furthering that.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: We'll come to the economics in a second, but just one more on the geopolitics because you're right that it's hard to characterize what the Trump doctrine is, if you will. It's not America first, it's not American alone, it might be America unconstrained. It has the elements that we can now tell. It is a transactional foreign policy. It is foreign policy that places much less weight on alliances. It's a bullying foreign policy overall. Is that a foreign policy? That is good for America.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I'm not going to comment on all that, because when you deal with the press, you guys always want binary answers to everything.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: I honestly think that's a reasonable question. Is it a good thing for America to have this kind of policy?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I’ll correct you a little bit. When I talk to the press, they never asked me to comment on everything that Biden did. And I think he did some terrible things, both domestically and in foreign policy. Do I agree with everything that Trump has mentioned? Of course not.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: But in aggregate.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: In aggregate, is this a good foreign policy? I don't know yet. If they were here, if I were talking to the president, I'd be saying exactly what I'm saying. This should be the goal. Here are the ways to get it. These things may be counter to that.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: So, there's an argument that China is actually the big winner from this approach, because China has stood up to the United States on tariffs. China is now projecting itself as a stable supporter of multilateralism. Do you think China is the winner from this?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I think that's a real stretch. China has a $15,000 per person GDP. Ours is $85,000. We have the most dynamic economy and prosperous nation the world has ever seen. We have 40 military lines, 140 economic alliances. They have one. They've done a great job in so many things, but they still import 10 million barrels of oil a day. Yeah, this has created some openings for them. Are they going to be the best economic or military alliance for a lot of the people out there who are mad at America? Probably not.
So, I take a deep breath on that one, and it's easy to say, I think they've done things right. They have serious problems. In their economy - they've got kind of two economies - the consumer, real estate, allocation of capital, huge investment in technology. I applaud them. EV cars and batteries and stuff like that. But whether that works over a long period of time, I do not know.
They’re on their own, without us. You guys always forget to mention that South Korea Japan, Australia, Philippines, they're all rearming on their own. That's China's actions that cause that, not America's actions. I remember how they got Korea and Japan working together, saying they're going to rearm, which I think they have to at this point. And so, yeah, there are a lot of things taking place here, not just one. And so, I try to keep an open minded about all those things and give as best advice I can to my country or other people in the world.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: There are a lot of things happening at the same time, but I'm just trying to get a sense from you about the scale of the moment. Do you think this is, as Prime Minister Carney has called it, a rupture? Do you think we are shifting? Is this post-war order that we all talked about, including you, I think in previous shareholder letters, is that over? Are we in a new world now?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Again, you're making it binary. I don't know. I saw part of Carney's speech and I have a lot of respect for Carney. We're causing some things. It may not be good in the long run for America. Carney was just in China and now he's going to go to India and trips like that. It's not a rupture. If you said to me, has America become unreliable? No. It's just you had total reliance on us and now it's less reliable. You know, it's fine with us, right.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: I mean, if you are less reliable. At some point, you become unreliable?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: But we're still a military ally to over 40 countries. When I talk to the military, they're geared up to defend their allies around the world. Trump hasn't stopped all that. So, I think it's time for people to take a little bit of a deep breath. That does not mean I like it all. And of course, all my Democratic friends send me notes: “You've got to say this, you've got to say that, you got to see this.” And my point is, well, no, they never go through any detail whatsoever. They just huff and puff and get angry. And that doesn't work. So, I know what I believe in, I'm going to write some more about it in my chairman's letter. I think the worker don't wanna work and that's what I'm gonna do.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Let's talk about economic policy, where there's also been a pretty big change. Two big areas. We've gone from a US that underwrote multilateral trade rules to a US that believes in tariffs. Now, the tariffs that have ended up being imposed are 10% probably on average, not quite as high as we feared on Liberation Day. Is that a good idea?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Again, it's not binary. You guys, you have got to get your heads out of your own echo chamber. There are three parts to trade, okay? And some require tariffs, okay. One part is national security. We should do what we have to do to create national security around rare earths, around advanced active pharmaceutical ingredients. And some of that may require policy that is not typical like tariffs. Pay long-term data contracts, so you can build the stuff where you need to, and some advanced manufacturers in category. These companies cannot succeed if there aren't barriers, quotas, tariffs or pay for play. Absolutely a sine qua non.
I would do what I have to do to protect the American NASDAQ. The second one is unfair trade. And there's a lot of unfair imported trade. I just don't think furniture or t-shirts are only imported trade, but there is unfair trade. It's in some places blown out of proportion. If you are subsidizing China, in this case, or anyone, subsidizing their cars, their batteries, this, that, so anyone who tries to compete is going to get sunk because of subsidies. And the subsidies can come in various forms, then you should counter that. You can counter that with quotas. A lot of countries have quotas, you can counter with tariffs, perfectly fine. As long as there's a reason for it. But I'm not a tariff guy in general. I don't think in general it's a great idea, but it is what it is.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: But the president is a tariff guy. He loves tariffs.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase Yes.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: So, this is an area where you would disagree?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase Yes.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Immigration, another big change in immigration policy. We've essentially gone from a huge amount of unconstrained immigration, which clearly the president ran on countering and has done, but to a United States that is much, much more skeptical of immigration, both legal and illegal. Is that good?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase So, I'm still angry at the Biden administration for what they allowed to happen, okay? And I think it's severely damaged our country. And then they say there's nothing you can do about it. Trump comes in, boom, borders are closed. God bless him!
You know, countries have to control their borders or it will cause huge problems. And you have this lack all over Europe and it's even worse because in America, most people coming to America, want to be American. They come to work. They can't wait to become a citizen of the United States of America. That's not true for most of the European immigration. I was with President Trump when Trump won. Oh, and I said to him, when you get the borders controlled, fix the rest of it. He said, yeah. More merit base, he said. Absolutely. A path to citizenship for hardworking people, absolutely, and proper asylum. I would urge him to do that. I think he can because he controlled the borders and stuff like that.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Do you see much evidence of that?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Not yet. A little bit on the merit side. You see them talking about the merit side. And of course, I don't like what I'm seeing with five grown men beating up little women. OK, so I think we should calm down a little bit on the internal anger about immigration. And for those people, I've heard Trump say, even this term, we need these people. They work in our hospitals and our hotels and restaurants and agriculture. They're good people, because we all know them. They are good people and they should be treated that way.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: That's not what you're seeing on the streets?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: You know what, yes, it's not always what you see, and I think rounding up criminals is one thing. I don't have a chart. And I'm a fanatic about detail. Show me who's been rounded up. Are they here legally? Are they criminals? Did they break American law? I don't like what I'm seeing. But it's hard for me to tell whether that's just what the liberal press plays.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: You're beginning to sound quite Trumpy in this, the liberal press base?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I'm not Trump, you know, I'm a realist, and I like facts in detail and not binary shit that goes on all the time. I think The Economist is the absolute best, most analytical media in the world, and you should continue to be that.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Absolutely. Well, we do. We are and we do. Let's talk about one other area: The attack on institutions and undermining of independent institutions like the Fed being the obvious one. There has been clear pressure on the Fed, notably 10 days ago, the announcement on a subpoena for a criminal investigation on the Chair. Is that a good idea?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Everyone I know, including President Trump, says we should have an independent Fed. There's two parts to the Fed. One is monetary, that needs to be independent. The other is regulatory, huge overreach. That's not independent, that's law. I think the things that undercut independence are not good. I don't like lawfare. I've had to deal with lawfare my whole life.
I mean, going way back, being treated unfairly sometimes, fairly sometimes, but blown out of proportion. I think that undercuts it. So, I think the power will be gone in a few months. I think constant statements is a mistake. And just so you know, the Fed doesn't really set interest rates. Just listen closely to me. What happens if inflation goes up? They raise interest rates, what happens if the inflation goes down? They reduce interest rates.
They are a fast follower. And if you look at all Fed history, it isn't like they're completely independent. Every American president wants lower rates, but the last time a president had lower rates was Arthur Burns, President Nixon, who had a 60% approval rating when he got elected. Inflation was only 3.5%. It kept on going up. Of course, there was Watergate and the oil crisis, but markets were down 40%. He resigns in disgrace.
Inflation and with deficits half with and deficits are inflationary with deficits. Half what they are today. Interest went to 4, 5, 6, 7% and you can come up with all the reasons: stronger unions, the oil issues, and all that, but inflation stayed and the Fed must deal with inflation. That's a judgment from a lot of people.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: But just to be very clear, what we're seeing now is lawfare and you're against it?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I don't like the courts doing stuff like that. I think they should be very thoughtful about when they pick something up like that. And this has been going on my whole life, too. So, this isn't just President Trump. Let's be clear about DOJ overreach, it's been consistent now for 20 years. And in the old days, the DOJ would step into something, when it was referred to them by either civil or criminal, now they just read the paper and step in. And that's a mistake, because to them, they're a hammer. To them, everything's a nail.
In the old days, the DOJ would step into something, when it was referred to them by either civil or criminal, now they just read the paper and step in. And that's a mistake, because to them, they're a hammer. To them, everything's a nail.
”Zanny Minton Beddoes: One of President Trump's recent proposals that would directly affect you, to improve affordability, is to impose a 10% cap on credit card rates. Is that a bad idea?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: It would be an economic disaster. And I'm not making it up, because our business, we would survive it, by the way. You would, in the worst case, you'd have to have a drastic reduction of the credit card business. I mean drastic. I mean like 80%. It would remove credit from 80% of Americans, and that is their backup credit. But I have a great idea. Since there's a huge disagreement on this one, between Republicans and Democrats, I think we should test it. And in my view, and I can't do this because it would be antitrust, but the government can do it. They should force all the banks to do it in two states, Vermont and Massachusetts, and see what happens. And then I think the left will learn a real lesson, and the people crying the most won't be the credit card companies. It will be the restaurants, the retailers, the travel companies, the schools, the municipalities. People will miss their water payments, this payment and that payment. It would be something else to watch. I think they should test it.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Well, in fact, maybe they're determined to test it more broadly?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Well then, okay, whatever it is we'll deal with it. I think it's wrong for the government to get involved extensively in pricing and stuff, but I gotta deal with the world I got.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: I'm kind of interested.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: We're going to give them at one point real analysis on the effects of this. We've given some, but not a lot.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Kind of interesting when I ask you something that you say it will be a complete economic disaster when I speak broadly about geopolitics, you're very reluctant to criticize.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase There's a one I know exactly, the other one is more qualitative, how it's going to work, what are the pieces, what's their intent, how are people going to respond. They're not the same thing. But the economics, when you believe something to be true, you should say that. So, the economics of the card thing, we'll see.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Do you think so?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase I've not seen anyone, really, Republicans, senators, businesses, banks, credit unions, community banks, anyone think it's a good idea.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: Do you think it is?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: It goes back to this thing about this word affordability. Of course, we want affordability, the Democrats don't know affordability but what we've screwed up as a nation is bad policy around housing, mortgages, affordable health, immigration. We've messed up so many policies, which I write about. It's time to fix them. And I think the economists can help do that because you guys are really smart people. And so. And we constantly have this economic policy that we don't think through. We've driven half the companies out of the public markets. What are we doing? Why did that happen? And then we just can't deal with reality anymore because we want a simple answer to everything.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: When you add up all the things we've been talking about, the president's policies, both geopolitically and economically, and the tech change that we're living through, do you think the US economy is on balance in better shape or worse shape?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: You know, it’s been hugely resilient. It’s in pretty good shape. You’re going to have a lot of stimulus oil in this year, so you’re going to, in multiple forms, from the one big, beautiful bill, to what they’re doing with student lending, to some of the mortgage purchasing they’re doing, deregulation of banks, which is real deregulation, which feeds animal spirits.
Our economy is so large and so integrated, so complex, and it’s hard to always tell, but the innovation is unbelievable. You take a trip to Silicon Valley and look at these companies, it blows you away. The brain power going to fixing things and curing cancer and fixing machines. So I think it’s great.
So when you talk about economic policy, I think what government should be focused more on is policy conducive to growth. And then, of course, you have policies that help the old, the sick, the aged, et cetera. And we don’t do good in that in a lot of cases. So we could do a better job making the economy work for everybody.
And it is a little bit of this K economy now. We do see that, where the upper income are doing far better. They’ve got houses and stocks, and the lower side, they’re back to normal, which is they don’t have enough of a rainy day fund. Jobs are getting a little harder to get, incomes have stopped growing a little bit. And we’re quite conscious of that.
And I think there are things we can do. For example, and we’ve done it now, I would double the earned income tax credit. I would give people working more money as a negative tax. So you’re making $14,000, you get a check from the government of $12,000. I get rid of the child requirement. Then you give it to the people who actually use it to further their lives, spend in their communities, take care of their kids, as opposed to government dictating how you spend money on every little thing you do.
And so I think there are real fixes that make society work better for everybody. Would you raise taxes to pay for that? I don’t think you’d have to. I think it would drive a lot of growth. I think I did the numbers at one point, it’d be $60 billion of spending. I think it would probably create more than that in growth and taxes. And if you have to raise tax a little bit, that’s fine. But again, I don’t want to buy your argument. I don’t know anyone, OK, and you guys in the room, you know, Democrats, Republicans, who think sending another trillion dollars to Washington, DC will actually improve anything. So when you say raise taxes, if you said raise taxes and directly give it to the people who need it, do it. No? But that’s not what happens.
So we are running out of time. It goes to all these interest groups, you know, and they give it to their friends. Which is why the people consider it a swamp. It’s kind of a swamp, you know, the 17,000 lobbying groups. But companies are guilty too. They’re just fighting for their own self interest as opposed to what’s good for my country. But that’s what happens in Congress. And you see how these bills get spent. Like the CHIPS Act was a good idea, until it had to be unions, place based child care, diapers. What the hell are we doing? And then we do it over and over, and then it fails, and then we spend more money, because the problem is we just didn’t spend enough money.
What the hell are we doing? And then we do it over and over, and then it fails, and then we spend more money, because the problem is we just didn’t spend enough money.
”Zanny Minton Beddoes: So you’re a man with many strong opinions. We’ve heard that in the last few minutes. A man not afraid to tell us about those opinions. But I was struck, when we were talking about President Trump, that you were very, very careful. And you are one of the more outspoken, just let me finish, just let me finish. You are one of the more outspoken business leaders. I am struck, I’m genuinely struck, by the unwillingness of CEOs in America to say anything critical. There is a climate of fear in your country. Would you agree with that? And what should be done about it?
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: This is the Davos intellectual elite. You know, I’ve been coming to Davos all these years and listening to chatter and stuff like that. And you didn’t do a particularly good job making the world a better place. I think it’s great we get together and talk. But the part that you want me to do, this is… I want to answer your question. It’s not hard. You may want that one line that gets a hook.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: No, I don’t! Jamie, that’s not true. I’m genuine. I’ve asked you this question off camera.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: I’ve made it clear. I want a stronger NATO, a stronger Europe. Some of the things Trump has done are causing that, some are not. I’m not a tariff guy, though I’ve used it in the eight cases I had. I think they should change their approach to immigration. I’ve said it. What the hell else do you want me to say? Is there a climate of fear? I think that is completely clear. You know, hey, ready? Here’s your headline. I’m a globalist.
Zanny Minton Beddoes: I’m not looking for a headline. I’m trying to have a conversation. I’m not looking for a headline, but I enjoyed that. We’re running out of time. Thank you very much. Thank you.
Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase: Thank you very much. Appreciate it.
JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon, the CEO of one of the largest banks in the world, has a frank and lively one-on-one conversation in Davos with Economist editor-in-chief Zanny Minton Beddoes, on a host of topics, including: what’s needed to unlock growth; how rapid technological shifts could spur economic growth; how AI is integrated AI into the typical JPMorgan workday and the policy move that could be an “economic disaster.” He also shares what’s driven his successes, what his failures have in common and why not every question will have a simple answer.
Recorded at the Annual Meeting in Davos Switzerland 2026.
每周为您呈现推动全球议程的紧要问题(英文)
Gayle Markovitz and David Elliott
2026年1月21日









