JP Morgan Waiting on Government to Pay Taxpayers Back

Sat, 04/18/2009 - 2:32pm | posted by Jason Pye

According to JP Morgan’s CEO, Jamie Dimon, the financial giant can immediately return TARP money to taxpayers , but his company is waiting on the government:

Dimon, calling money received through the Troubled Asset Relief Program “a scarlet letter” and “the TARP baby,” said on a conference call with reporters today that the New York- based bank is awaiting guidance from the U.S. Treasury Department. “We could pay it back tomorrow,” he said.
The 53-year-old CEO received $25 billion in U.S. government rescue funds last year. Dimon is among banking industry CEOs who have said pay limits imposed by lawmakers are pushing many employees to foreign or non-TARP firms.
[…]
The bank, which bought about $34 billion in mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities in the quarter, doesn’t expect to participate as either a buyer or seller in the Treasury’s Public-Private Investment Program, known as PPIP. “We learned our lesson” about borrowing from the government, said Dimon, who expects PPIP to benefit the financial system as a whole.

This isn’t the first instance of this from what I’ve read. Glad they’ve learned a lesson those. Maybe they’ll think twice before rent-seeking.

H/T: Club for Growth