JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon has revealed plans to sell over $140 million worth of JPMorgan stock for the first time during his 17-year tenure, according to a new filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Dimon will sell 1 million shares, equating to around 11% of his total stake in the bank.
The sale marks a major move for Dimon, who has never before cashed out shares since taking over the helm of JPMorgan in 2005. According to the filing, the stock sale is meant to allow for "financial diversification" and "tax planning purposes." Despite the multi-million dollar selloff, Dimon will still retain a "very significant" amount of shares and interest in JPMorgan's future performance.
Shares of JPMorgan dipped over 1% in premarket trading following the news, while other major bank stocks remained relatively flat. Dimon's remaining stake of 7.6 million shares is currently valued at around $1.2 billion based on JPMorgan's latest stock price.
Forbes estimates Dimon's total net worth at $1.7 billion, ranking him among the world's top billionaires. The bulk of his wealth comes from his long-term position at JPMorgan, which recently surpassed Bank of America as the largest U.S. bank in terms of assets.
While this will be Dimon's first such sale, stock selloffs by corporate executives are commonplace. Just this month, Apple CEO Tim Cook sold nearly $50 million worth of company shares as part of routine portfolio diversification. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang also offloaded $144 million in stock around the same time.
The timing aligns with increased financial volatility and uncertainty, which prompted Dimon to recently declare this the "most dangerous time" for the economy since the 2008 crisis. As head of the largest U.S. bank, Dimon has steered JPMorgan through upheaval before, including playing a key role in the acquisition of Washington Mutual at the peak of the housing crisis.
More recently, JPMorgan made waves by acquiring the majority of assets from the failed First Republic Bank - the first collapse of a systemic U.S. bank since the Great Recession. While once relatively rare, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation has taken over five banks so far in 2022 as interest rate hikes expose cracks in the system.
Despite his significant stock sale, Jamie Dimon has given no indication of plans to step down from his leadership role at JPMorgan anytime soon. At 66 years old, he is still actively involved in managing risk and expansion efforts. And even after slimming his ownership stake, Dimon remains heavily invested - and invested in - the future performance of the bank he has led for nearly two decades.
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