You can’t move for bitcoin millionaires these days, or 20-somethings aching to tell you how they made a fortune with the cryptocurrency simply by sitting in their dorm – and how you can do the same.
If you want to work at J.P. Morgan, however, stay away from it. Jamie Dimon says that he’d fire “in a second” any trader employed by the bank who traded bitcoin. Speaking at the Barclays Financial Services Conference yesterday, he described it as a “fraud”, “worse than tulips” and only a better option than U.S. dollars if you’re a “drug dealer, a murderer stuff like that”.
“If we had a trader who traded bitcoin I’d fire him in a second for two reasons. One, it’s against our rules. Two, it’s stupid. And both are dangerous,” said Dimon.
“You can’t have a business where people are going to invent a currency out of thin air,” he added. “It won’t end well… someone is going to get killed and then the government is going to come down on it.”
Dimon said he wasn’t going to short the currency because it’s so hard to predict when it will drop. “It could be at $20,000 before this happens but it will eventually blow up. It’s a fraud and honestly I’m just shocked anyone can’t see it for what it is.”
Bitcoin entrepreneurs talking it up is one thing, but Dimon’s words have an impact. As Bloomberg points out, it dropped by 2.1% in the immediate aftermath of his comments.
Separately, Goldman’s plans to build out its fixed income currency and commodities unit have dominated COO Harvey Schwartz’s presentation to see “what’s happening under the hood” at the bank. But beyond the build out of new sales, trading and strats staff at Goldman Sachs, it’s also hiring investment bankers.
However, Goldman isn’t building on Wall Street – it’s hiring in Atlanta, Dallas, Seattle, and Toronto. If this seems a little obscure, it’s not the only bank hiring in the U.S. outside of the traditional financial services mainstay. As Business Insider points out, JPMorgan and Bank of America Merrill Lynch have employed a similar strategy – capturing lucrative middle-market deals in the U.S. and Canada that paid $8.2 billion in deal fees in 2015. This is more than Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America combined.
Meanwhile:
Trading revenue will fall by 20% at J.P. Morgan in the third quarter, says Jamie Dimon (WSJ)
Goldman’s co-head of investment banking Gregg Lemkau says clarity needed from Washington before M&A will take off (Bloomberg)
Goldman’s big problem with trying to win more business in FICC – its rivals (Gadfly)
Ray Dalio doesn’t want Gary Cohn to quit (Business Insider)
Why voice traders should fear MiFID II (Bloomberg)
“Overzealous” MiFID II regulation could see trading firms head elsewhere (Financial Times)
It’s a risk for fund managers to force clients to pay for research (Financial News)
Morgan Stanley’s head of emerging markets, Kay Haigh, who came back to banking after starting his own hedge fund, has left again to work for a hedge fund (HFM Week)
Banks’ 50-year-old IT problem: “Clearly we make all of our money from the systems we have today, not from systems of the future. [Upgrades] can’t put any of the systems of today at risk” (Financial News)
Banks are most at risk from AI job losses (The Conversation)
Winton is trying to lure scientists into making predictions about climate change (Financial Times)
Contact for news, tips and comments: pclarke@efinancialcareers.com
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