One name comes up again and again when we look back at critical tipping points in the financial system. Whether it is Lehman, WaMu, MFGlobal, or more recently Knight Capital’s implosion, the house-of-Dimon is tied directly, in one way or another, to creating the crisis or offering ‘help’ to fix it. As the WSJ notes, the Knight CEO Thomas Joyce reached out “we’re looking for help”and sure enough JPMorgan were more than happy to help (with just the right amount of vigorish of course) especially given their ‘complicated’ relationship with Knight (and MFGlobal) at the time of distress. Sure enough, after playing hardball for 2 days, they agree terms and Knight is saved (for now) but once again the bank-that-didn’t-need-TARP fixes another tempest-in-a-teapot as the squid and the whale battle for global interconnected dominance.
