The ‘Jamie premium’ nears $1 trillion as JP Morgan flirts with historic market valuation

JPMorgan Chase is closing in on a milestone no bank has ever reached.

The financial giant was worth roughly $970 billion on Monday morning—a modest stock-market rally away from becoming the first bank in the world with a $1 trillion market cap and a far cry from its $138 billion valuation on December 30, 2005, just before he took over. Last month, JPMorgan posted the highest-ever quarterly profit by a U.S. bank.

Getting to $1 trillion would be the latest payoff from a playbook CEO Jamie Dimon has spent two decades refining: maintain enough financial firepower to withstand crises, keep investing when rivals pull back, and use periods of industry turmoil to expand.

That combination has repeatedly allowed JPMorgan to go on offense when competitors were under pressure. Dimon has long emphasized what he calls the bank’s “fortress balance sheet,” which helped JPMorgan acquire Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual Read Entire Article