JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon on Friday downplayed the likelihood he’ll have a role in the next presidential administration, and seemed to add uncertainty around the remainder of his time at the bank’s helm.

When Wells Fargo analyst Mike Mayo asked Dimon, during the bank’s third-quarter earnings call, about his government-related commentary this year and whether he’d consider accepting a job with a future presidential administration, Dimon largely pooh-poohed the idea.

“I think the chance of that is almost nil, and I probably am not going to do it,” Dimon responded. Still, “I always reserve the right – I don’t make promises, because I don’t have to,” he added. 

In August, Dimon wrote an op-ed for the Washington Post, calling for a president that will unite the country and fortify America’s role as a global leader. Earlier this year, Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump said he would consider Dimon – and then claimed he didn’t say that – for Treasury secretary, if elected. 

But he appeared to underscore his commitment to the U.S.’s biggest bank Friday, saying, “I almost guarantee I’ll be doing this for a long period of time, or at least until the board kicks me out,” Dimon said. 

Until this year, Dimon, 68, has reiterated that his eventual departure is five years away. At the New York-based bank’s most recent investor day in May, Dimon deviated from that standard response, saying the timetable “isn’t five years anymore,” and succession planning at JPMorgan is well underway. 

Dimon disagreed with Mayo’s assessment that he seems more likely to take a government-related job now than in the past based on the CEO’s recent commentary. “I’ve always been an American patriot,” Dimon said. “My country is more important to me than my company.” 

“It is so important that we get things right for the whole geopolitical world,” not just the American economy, Dimon continued. JPMorgan aims to engage on policy, from the local to the international level, and it’s the bank’s job to try to help grow economies, he asserted. 

Dimon said his opinions and interest level haven’t changed. “I just think it’s very, very important that we try to help government do a good job,” he said.

‘Anxiously awaiting’ Basel revamp details

Asked how they’re thinking about the capital requirements proposal tweaks floated by Michael Barr, the Federal Reserve’s vice chair for supervision, last month, Dimon and JPMorgan CFO Jeremy Barnum stressed that they’re eager for more information. 

“In the end, we actually just really need to see the proposal, because the details matter a lot for this stuff,” Barnum said. He also believes it’s important to be “careful not to fall into the trap of saying that that’s, like, progress, just because the original proposal was so dramatically higher than what anyone thought was reasonable.” Proposed changes would cut roughly in half the amount of extra capital large banks would have been forced to hold, from about 19% to 9%. 

That’s akin to what Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan said last month, in reaction to Barr’s preview of the proposal’s revisions. “There’s an old phrase, ‘Show them death, and they’ll take despair.’ I sometimes feel that that’s what we just got,” Moynihan said at an industry conference.  

“We just want the numbers to be done right,” Dimon said, “with due diligence” and “real thought.” JPMorgan executives are “anxiously awaiting” actual details, he added. “That’s what’s going to make all the difference.”  

Wells’ spending encompasses AML work

During the third quarter, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency issued an enforcement action against Wells Fargo, related to flaws with its anti-money laundering internal controls and the bank’s financial crimes risk management practices.

“Like all of the control-related work, we’re going to spend whatever is necessary” to address the issues, Wells CEO Charlie Scharf said Friday during the company’s third-quarter earnings call. At this point, the San Francisco-based bank doesn’t envision meaningful changes to the $54 billion it’s projected for expenses this year, Scharf noted. 

“A significant amount of the work that is required in the consent order, we’ve been working on,” he told analysts. “We’re spending a significant amount of money relative to what’s necessary in that order already.” 

When an analyst wondered whether the AML issues are Wells-specific or broader, Scharf declined to comment.

Executives were also asked about next steps as it relates to the eventual lifting of a $1.95 trillion asset cap that has constrained the bank’s size since 2018. The lender recently submitted to the Fed a third-party review of the bank’s risk and control revamp, Bloomberg reported last month, citing unnamed sources.

Scharf wouldn’t speak to specifics, but reviewed the process generally, from a consent order’s issuance, to the company’s efforts to remediate issues and inform regulators of work done, to regulators’ review and “series of formal processes” to decide whether the work has been done to their satisfaction. 

“And when that’s done, we find out about it, and you find out about it,” Scharf said.

Within the 2018 consent order connected to the asset cap, the board was ordered to be more effective, and the bank, to build out operational risk and compliance, he noted. 

“To lift the asset cap, that work needs to be adopted and implemented, and to lift the entire consent order, it needs to be effective and sustainable,” he said. “The way the Fed will interpret those things, relative to things going on in the company, is certainly their bailiwick.” 

On CRE, ‘things aren’t getting better’

Both banks benefited from a boost in investment banking fees during the third quarter. JPMorgan saw a 31% jump year-over-year, while Wells reported a 37% increase – a bright spot for each Wall Street bank in light of lackluster net interest income.

Net interest income for Wells dropped 11%, to $11.7 billion, the bank said in an earnings release. For JPMorgan, that metric rose 3%, to $23.5 billion, according to the bank’s earnings release. 

JPMorgan’s net income dipped 2%, to $12.9 billion, as the bank set aside more for potential loan losses; Wells’ profit dropped 11%, to $5.1 billion. 

On the commercial real estate side, Wells noted the office segment remains a concern, with additional losses expected, although it’s an issue that’ll continue to play out over a long period of time. “Things aren’t getting better,” Scharf said. “It is kind of more of the same, but it’s impacting more properties.”

Wells reported CRE net loan charge-offs of $184 million, largely driven by those in the office sector, and a $17 million increase in its allowance for credit losses for CRE office loans, to $2.4 billion, according to the bank’s earnings presentation.