Head of Independent Community Bankers of America disputes Wall Street Journal op-ed

Fine

Jamie Dimon, chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase (the largest bank by assets in the country) appealed for unity among big and small banks in an April 5 op-ed in The Wall Street Journal.

Hooey, says Cam Fine, CEO of the $39 million-revenue Independent Community Bankers of America, who claims too much of the nation's wealth is concentrated in just a dozen top banks.

"You literally have a situation where you have too big to jail, not just too big to fail," Fine said, speaking like the fan of The Big Short that he is. (Fine said he gave a copy of Michael Lewis' highly critical book about the financial crisis to each of his board members, and loved the subsequent movie.)

Dimon just wants the still-positive bipartisan reputation of local banks to rub off on him, Fine told CEO Update. He had earlier responded to Dimon in an interview with Bloomberg News.

"When he calls for industry unity, that's more of a code word for the megabanks that have such a terrible reputation in Washington that we want to get behind the community banks and have them act as our shield so they can shelter our advocacy agenda," Fine said.

While big and small banks have some common policy objectives, those pale in comparison to the differences, Fine said. Enforcement of banking regulations is much more effective among community banks—where CEOs are ousted and directors held liable—than among Wall Street titans, which pay billion-dollar fines as a cost of doing business, he said.

Fine questioned why, if the big banks really want to engage small banks, there are so many trade groups that, he said, only large financial institutions can belong to. He cited the Financial Services Forum, the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, the Financial Services Roundtable and the Clearinghouse Association.

"To sort of magnanimously say we all ought to sing ‘Kumbaya' together, that doesn't work for us," Fine said.