Cut from the Chase; change banks
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Dear Mr. Berko:
I have owned 30 shares of JPMorgan Chase in my Independent Retirement Account since they sold for $63 each in February 2000. After you read this, I want to know if I should sell my stock in protest. Last year, you recommended I invest $4,000 in a certificate of deposit with Countrywide Bank. I did because it was a good 3 percent, nine-month rate. It came due last week, so I asked Countrywide to send a check to Washington Mutual, which is now JPMorgan Chase and where I’ve had an account since 1987. I discovered that Countrywide charged me $10 when it sent my money to Chase, and the JPMorgan Chase bank here in Winter Park, Fla., charged me $25 just to accept my check. They are stealing my money. They never told me that there would be a $25 charge. I spoke to a lady at Chase and nicely asked her if she would credit my account for the $25 fee for accepting the Countrywide check in my account. This lady was rude as can be. When I asked to talk to her supervisor, she said she was the supervisor. I stupidly said “thank you” and hung up. Now I’m angry for letting myself be intimidated by her aggressiveness. I’m a longtime good customer and should never have been treated like that. I am angry and I want my $25 back — and my $10, too — and I want to write to someone in authority to complain to and tell them that I’ve been a customer for 22 years and that they made me feel like a piece of you know what. Please give me the name and address of the CEO of JPMorgan Chase or someone else who would read my letter, apologize and return my $25.
S.G., Winter Park, Fla.
Dear S.G.:
The CEO of JPMorgan Chase Co. (JPM-$32.71) is a prominent member of the blue-blood Eastern establishment and goes by the name of James L. “Jamie” Dimon. The address of Jamie’s posh corporate digs is 270 Park Ave., New York, N.Y. 10017. You should see it — not even Julius Caesar’s reign could approximate the reeking opulence, the excessive grandeur and the awesome majesty of Jamie’s office. Even John Alexander Thain, the former CEO of Merrill Lynch, called it the eighth wonder of the world.
Last fall, when JPM needed bushels of billions to reinforce its capital accounts, Jamie devised a scheme by which the government used our tax dollars to purchase $25 billion of a new JPM preferred stock. Frankly, Jamie, who earned $41 million at JPM in 2008, doesn’t give a fig or ficus about your crummy $25. Posting him a note will have about as much impact as a teardrop in a rainstorm. This Ivy League, Harvard-educated “martini master” is the snake who approved that $25 charge, and he wouldn’t deign to make an exception for a commoner like you. I’ve received other complaints about JPM’s frivolous charges. I will give you the same advice I gave others: Move your accounts to a competitor and “spread the word.” Remember, these are the vipers who strangled consumers with hurtful, villainous credit card charges and fees.
How can they do that? The answer is simple. They are JPMorgan Chase. They can do anything they want. If each of their 5,500 branches accepts 10 checks a day, those $25 charges are worth $500 million a year in new income. Anyhow, it might be interesting if JPMorgan Chase customers checked their bank statements to see if this blackhearted bank euchred other fees from their deposits, too. But the worst damage is that after paying the $35 in fees, you earned only 2.1 percent on your CD, not 3 percent. Countrywide and JPMorgan Chase together cheated you out of $35. They got you by the kidney, and there’s nothing you can do.
I’ve also sent you the names of the members of JPM’s board of directors. Write each of those prissy blue bloods, who also approved that charge. Don’t expect a reply. I also suggest you write the Florida Office of Financial Regulation, so I’ve e-mailed you names and addresses of the 10 key officials in Tallahassee. Then write your congressman and your state representatives and the Orlando Sentinel, which is your local newspaper. Although those letters might make you feel better, they won’t accomplish bupkis. JPMorgan Chase has staffs of lawyers and lobbyists who toss cash like confetti to state and federal lawmakers, greasing every legislative wheel that squeaks.
Meanwhile, sell your 30 shares of JPM. I’m confident the stock will fail to return to the $63 level and that there are better investments to own. I would also sell JPM because it has a $90 TRILLION exposure in a $470 trillion derivative market. In other words, JPM owns 17 percent of this nasty paper, buried by Jamie in the balance sheet. That $90 trillion exposure scares the bejabbers out of me. Do you know what comes after trillion?
Please address your financial questions to Malcolm Berko, P.O. Box 1416, Boca Raton, Fla. 33429 or e-mail him at malber@comcast.net. ©2009 Creators Syndicate Inc.
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