JPMorgan Chase's $410 million deal to settle charges it manipulated electricity markets in California and Michigan brings the amount the bank has paid in fines and settlements in the past couple of years to nearly $7 billion.
That may sound like a lot, until you consider the metric bronto-tons of money the bank has made during that time (story continues below):
To put JPMorgan's profit in more perspective, consider it would take a little more than three months of work to cover the banks' $7 billion tab in fines and settlements. It would take the bank about 5.5 days to pay off that $410 million FERC settlement.
But still, the sheer number of the bank's regulatory and legal mix-ups is pretty impressive. The Daily Beast recently did the hard legwork of compiling all of these settlements into one helpful post, and I have spent countless seconds taking the Daily Beast's hard work and turning it into an infographic that might help you visualize just how many of these things there have been so far. You're welcome, America. (Story continues after super-helpful infographic.)
As the infographic says, this $7 billion figure doesn't even include JPMorgan's unknown portion of the $8.5 billion "robo-signing" settlement in January 2013. Nor does it include the $6 billion or so the bank lost on its botched "London Whale" derivatives trades. Nor does it include the many other regulatory investigations in which JPMorgan is reportedly involved, including the LIBOR manipulation probe, a look into the bank's role in the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme and more.
You could argue JPMorgan Chase is the biggest bank in the U.S. and therefore has lots going on, increasing the risk that it will run afoul of the authorities and/or customers.
Or you could say the bank is "out of control," as Graham Fisher analyst Joshua Rosner did earlier this year. You could even say it is the Great White Whale, a bigger influence and potential headache for global financial markets than the Vampire Squid of Goldman Sachs, as some HuffPost idjit did last year.
Either way, these problems so far aren't having much impact on the bank's ability to mint money.
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