Markets worldwide are starting to resemble the era before the 2008 financial crisis and recession, warned JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon on Monday an event hosted by his company.
“Unfortunately, we did see this in '05, '06, '07, almost the same thing," Dimon said at JPMorgan's annual investor meeting in reference to the years before the crisis. "The rising tide lifting all boats, everyone was making a lot of money, people leveraging to the hilt. The sky was the limit.”
“And I think today, the rising tide is lifting all boats. My own view is people getting a little comfortable that this is real, these high asset prices and high volumes, and we won’t have any kind of problem, whatsoever,” he also said. “I don’t know how long it’s going to be great for everybody. I see a couple of people doing some dumb things.”
Dimon did not provide more details on what people or institutions he was talking about. But he stressed that JPMorgan is being "quite cautious" in its approach ahead of possible market turbulence.
Earlier this month, the Dow Jones Industrial Average surpassed the 50,000-mark for the first time in its history. As of Tuesday, the Dow stood at around 49,100, coming after it dropped around 800 points a day earlier.
However, data released by the Department of Commerce show that U.S. gross domestic product, or GDP, in the fourth quarter rose at an annualized rate of 1.4 percent, which was lower than what economists had forecast.
Ahead of the release of the GDP report on Feb. 20, President Donald Trump flagged the report by saying that the government shutdown from October to mid-November 2025 had "cost the U.S.A. at least two points in GDP. That's why they are doing it, in mini form, again. No Shutdowns! Also, LOWER INTEREST RATES."
At Monday's event, Dimon said he would remain as the head of JPMorgan, the largest bank in the United States, for a "few years." After that, he could serve as the bank's executive chairman, Dimon suggested.
Last year, the JPMorgan head publicly said he has adopted a cautious stance on the U.S. economy for several quarters now and stated that accurate forecasts are a challenge because key shifts are apparent only in hindsight.
And in September, he said that the U.S. economy is slowing down after the Labor Department released a report that revised lower its nonfarm payrolls data through March 2025 by 911,000 jobs.
“I think the economy is weakening,” Dimon told CNBC at the time. “Whether it’s on the way to recession or just weakening, I don’t know.”
But he noted that "there’s a lot of different factors in the economy right now" before adding, “We just have to wait and see.”