Ireland went from being the poorest member of the European Economic Community in 1973 to enjoying the second highest per-capita income among European countries by 2007.  Healthy growth in the 1990s eventually gave way to a concentrated boom in property-related lending in the 2000s.  The growth...

All public companies in the European Union, including Ireland’s major banks, were required to adopt IAS 39 for their annual accounting periods beginning on or after January 1, 2005.  Under the “incurred loss” model of IAS 39, banks could set aside reserves for loan losses only when...

In December 2011, the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer of JPMorgan Chase (JPM) instructed the bank’s Chief Investment Office to reduce the size of its Synthetic Credit Portfolio (SCP) during 2012, so that JPM could decrease its Risk-Weighted Assets as the bank prepared to...

On April 13, 2012, JPMorgan Chase (JPM) Chief Financial Officer Douglas Braunstein took part in a conference call to discuss the bank’s first quarter 2012 earnings.  Coming just a week after media reports first questioned the risks taken by JPM derivatives trader Bruno Iksil, Braunstein made...

After consistently producing positive results through 2011, the JPMorgan Chase (JPM) traders who oversaw the bank’s Synthetic Credit Portfolio (SCP) grew alarmed by a consistent string of losses beginning in January 2012.  (The SCP was maintained by JPM to help hedge default risk and was the...

In December 2011, the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer of JPMorgan Chase (JPM) instructed the bank’s Chief Investment Office to reduce the size of its Synthetic Credit Portfolio (SCP) during 2012, so that JPM could decrease its Risk-Weighted Assets as the bank prepared to...

As a diversified financial service provider and the largest United States bank holding company, JPMorgan Chase (JPM) is supervised by multiple regulatory agencies.  JPM’s commercial bank subsidiaries hold a national charter and therefore are regulated by the Office of the Comptroller of the...

At year-end 2005, almost all of the total assets of Iceland’s banking system were concentrated in just three banks (Glitnir, Kaupthing, and Landsbanki).  These banks were criticized by certain financial analysts in early 2006 for being overly dependent on wholesale funding, much of it...

As a global financial service provider, JPMorgan Chase (JPM) is supervised by banking regulatory agencies in different countries.  Bruno Iksil, the derivatives trader primarily responsible for the $6 billion trading loss in 2012, was based in JPM’s London office.  This office was regulated...

All major financial institutions use various risk limits, metrics, and models to monitor the risk of their activities.  Value at Risk (VaR) is one of the most commonly used ways to measure and monitor market risk.  At JPMorgan Chase (JPM), very large derivative positions established by Bruno...