Dimon says retirement from JPMorgan is 'several years away'

Bloomberg

Jamie Dimon said his retirement from the top post at JPMorganChase is "several years away," but the decision is up to the bank's directors.

"It's up to God and the board," the 69-year-old chief executive officer said in a taped interview aired Monday on Fox Business. "I love what I do."

The question of when Dimon would retire and who might succeed him has hung over JPMorgan for years. Dimon used to joke that retirement was five years away, no matter when asked, but has recently stopped giving that answer.

JPMorgan boosted Dimon's pay to $39 million for 2024, a year in which the biggest U.S. bank beat its own record for the highest annual profit in the history of American banking.

In the wide-ranging interview, Dimon also repeated his recent commentary that a "crack" in the U.S. bond market is inevitable, though he wouldn't predict exactly when that might happen.

In May, Dimon said that the bank has lost international business recently, as certain clients have retreated from working with American banks in the wake of roller-coaster tariff policies.

Some international clients have moved from JPMorgan to banks based in Europe and Canada, but not because they're dissatisfied or upset with the American bank, Dimon said during an Investor Day presentation.

"We've lost business because of that," Dimon said. "It's not that big. It's not that significant. ... I do expect there'll be some of that if this trade war gets worse, but it's not going to change our plans."

Even though the Trump administration's more extreme tariff policies have been put on pause, JPMorgan is still planning for possible stress, since the trade war's final resolution remains uncertain. Dimon said that even at their current levels, tariffs are stirring up risks to the economy.

Dimon added that he believes the market is underestimating the potential effects of geopolitical risk. The worst-case outcome for a bank is so-called stagflation, when the economy gets hit by a recession and inflation simultaneously, he said.

The JPMorgan CEO said he thinks the chances of stagflation, which reared its head in the 1970s, are roughly two times what the market predicts. If there is a recession, Dimon is predicting that credit losses will be worse than most estimates.

Still, Dimon said his own bank would be fine.

The nation's largest bank maintained its net interest income guidance for the year at $90 billion, and it's hopeful about beating that forecast, Chief Financial Officer Jeremy Barnum said in May.

Some of the headwinds JPMorgan outlined a month ago "are now tailwinds," according to Barnum. The bank stopped short of upping its prediction for net interest income due to the continued volatility of the yield curve, he said.

Although the bank is optimistic about its 2025 performance, its management team still emphasized risks during their remarks.

"The evolving tariff environment, combined with the preexisting geopolitical tensions, adds significant uncertainty into the economic outlook," Barnum said. "And the combination of inflation and large fiscal deficits may constrain the available policy responses in ways that further increase the risk."

—Catherine Leffert contributed to this article.