JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE:JPM) is having its investor day today. Among the usual reviews of the company’s annual progress sprouted a verbal beat down for one particularly persevering analyst. Mike Mayo, an analyst from CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets, got told why Jamie Dimon is richer than he is.
Mayo asked the JPMorgan Chase & Co. CEO why the firm wasn’t able to raise more than the necessary capital to meet Basel III rules. The analyst pointed to UBS AG (NYSE:UBS) as an example of an investment bank able to do exactly that. Judging by his response, Jamie Dimon wasn’t pleased.
According to tweets from CNBC reporter Kayla Tausche, printed below, Dimon responded by asking if Mayo would move his money from JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE:JPM) because it couldn’t raise capital above regulatory standards. When Mayo told him that was what people were contending, Dimon told him resolutely that reasoning was why he’s richer than Mayo.
The interchange caused rounds of laughter at the meeting according to reports. Mike Mayo is well known on Wall Street as a particularly contradictory, and curmudgeonly analyst.
His most recent big campaign was an attempt to convince investors that breaking up big banks would unlock value for shareholders. That view was unpopular with the management of big banks, though it seemed to gain some traction in the middle of 2012. The analyst was particular forceful in his recommendation that Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) and Citigroup Inc. (NYSE:C) be broken up to unlock value.
The pernickety analyst is unlikely to be dissuaded from his questions because of the barb, but at least it provided some entertainment for those gathered at the event. Jamie Dimon will have to sharpen his tongue if he seeks to evade questions from Mayo, though judging by the analysts’ history, it will never be sharp enough.
H/T Joshua Brown, Reformed Broker, Julia La Roche.