Jamie Dimon agreed Wednesday with an analyst’s assessment that his “base case” for stepping down as JPMorgan Chase CEO is a few years from now.
The new comments on succession came one day after the nation’s largest bank announced a management reshuffling that raised new questions about the race to succeed the 68-year-old Dimon, the longest-serving big bank CEO.
The bank elevated Jennifer Piepszak to chief operating officer, replacing Dimon deputy Daniel Pinto, but said that Piepszak doesn’t want to succeed Dimon as CEO. Piepszak had previously been considered one of the frontrunners to get Dimon’s job eventually.
Dimon last year said that his timeline to step down as CEO “isn’t five years anymore.”
He told reporters Wednesday that the reshuffling “doesn’t change the timeline at all.” Wells Fargo’s Mike Mayo pressed him for more specifics on a separate call with analysts.
“Why not stay around a bit longer if investors want you to do so?” Mayo asked.
Dimon said “we’re on a path. The path is not just about me. It’s about the other senior people in the company. It’s about the board. If I’m here for several more years, and I may or may not be chairman of that, it’s going to be up to the board. But does it really fit the new CEO and stuff like that?”
“Now you’re talking potentially 4, 5 years or more. I’ll be 69 in March. I think it’s the rational thing to do.”
When Mayo asked whom his successor would be, Dimon said “we have several exceptional people.”
The view now within the bank is that three other executives — Marianne Lake, Doug Petno, and Troy Rohrbaugh — are the best candidates to become CEO.
“You guys know most of them. Maybe 1 or 2 you don’t know,” Dimon said. But “it’s not determined yet.”
“And of course, at the last minute, a couple of years from now, people get sick, they change their mind, they have family circumstances. So even if you thought you knew today, you couldn’t be completely sure.”
Mayo asked: “So you’ll stay around maybe for a few more years, base case right now?”
Dimon agreed with that assessment: “Yes. Basic case, yes.”
As of 12:00:44 PM EST. Market Open.
The JPMorgan CEO did have some compliments for Pinto, who took over his role temporarily in 2020 while Dimon faced heart surgery.
“He started in an entry level position from Argentina, took over Latin American trading, ended up running for over the last 10 years, the CIB and built, helped build, one of the best commercial investment banks in the world, and he was my partner as president, chief operating officer for over five years,” Dimon told both reporters and analysts.
