Washington Mutual closed by U.S. Government, JPMorgan Chase gets the cake and eats it too : Bad Credit Advisor

Washington Mutual closed by U.S. Government, JPMorgan Chase gets the cake and eats it too

And it isn't going to get fat. I'll tell you, JPMorgan Chief Executive Jamie Dimon is something else. First he gets Bear Stearns yummy leftovers for the puny $200 millions, now that. Exactly 119 years since its predecessor was incorporated on September 25, 1889, Washington Mutual or WaMu ceased to exist, with something close to $495 billions in assets and deposits being picked by JPMorgan Chase for a mere $1.9 billion. What a deal, of course misters Paulson, Bernanke and Geithner are three musketeers, but Dimon is D'Artagnan getting all the cream.

Washington Mutual as you are undoubtedly aware by now, pioneered or aggressively reintroduced infamous Option ARM mortgage, interest only adjustable rate mortgages and several other so-called Flex programs designed so everyone would get home. Did get big help from Countrywide of course. Both had it coming. By the way, if you compare $6 billions Bank of America paid for Countrywide and insane $50 billions for Merrill Lynch, its CEO Kenneth D. Lewis should be arrested by angry share holders. Just kidding, but Mr. Dimon pulled quite a deal. From 1998 to 2004, Washington Mutual grew by leaps and bounds, swallowing every mortgage company and bank it could. It lost over $6 billions, from November 2007 to June, mostly due to a very heavy presence at the most troubled housing markets - California, Florida, New York and Chicago. To sum it up ... there is no Wall Street anymore as we knew it - the disappearance of Bear Stearns, government takeovers of mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the insurer American International Group Inc, the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc, and Bank of America's purchase of Merrill.

Fri Sep 26, 2008 12:09AM by Tony | More in Economy | Comments (0)

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