CEO Dimon: JPMorgan Mistakes 'Self-inflicted'

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, facing shareholders five days after the bank disclosed a $2 billion trading loss, said Tuesday that the company's mistakes were "self-inflicted."

Dimon, speaking at the company's annual meeting, also said the company supports better and smarter financial regulation.

Almost immediately, he faced a proposal to strip him of his chairman's title. Lisa Lindsley, director of capital strategies for an influential union of public employees, said independent board leadership was in shareholders' best interest.

"An all-powerful CEO is his own boss," she said. "Looking for an infallible CEO is a fool's errand."

Dimon was expected to win the vote to keep the title of chairman and to win a non-binding vote on his $23 million pay package from last year. Most ballots were cast before Dimon disclosed the trading loss Thursday.

Peter Skillern, executive director of Reinvestment Partners, a nonprofit that holds JPMorgan stock, said he planned to speak at the meeting to encourage Dimon to resign from the board of the Federal Reserve's New York branch.

He said he would also support stripping Dimon of the chairman's title.

"He can't be his own boss and his own regulator," Skillern said. "It's not about whether Jamie Dimon is a good leader. It's about checks and balances and separation of power."

Investors have pummeled JPMorgan's stock price since the loss was revealed. The stock has dropped 12 percent and lost almost $20 billion in market value.

There was a heavy police presence at the meeting, in an office park east of downtown Tampa.

Dimon got something of a vote of confidence from President Barack Obama, who appeared on ABC's "The View" for an episode to be aired Tuesday. Obama used the appearance to press for tighter regulation of Wall Street.

"JPMorgan is one of the best-managed banks there is," the president said. "Jamie Dimon, the head of it, is one of the smartest bankers we got, and they still lost $2 billion and counting."

Obama said the bank was "making bets" in the market for the complex financial instruments known as derivatives. Dimon has said the bank was hedging against financial risk.

A part of the 2010 financial overhaul known as the Volcker rule would restrict banks from some trading for their own profit. Dimon and critics of the financial industry have disagreed over whether the trading in question would violate that rule.

Dimon is likely to repeat his acceptance of responsibility for the bad trade. He said in a TV interview Sunday that he was "dead wrong" when he dismissed concerns about the bank's trading last month.

"We made a terrible, egregious mistake," Dimon told NBC's "Meet the Press." ''There's almost no excuse for it."

On Monday, Ina Drew, the bank's chief investment officer and one of the highest-ranking women on Wall Street, left the bank. Drew oversaw the trading group responsible for the $2 billion loss.