JPMorgan Chase’s cowboy-style speculation with its depositors’ money puts the entire financial system at risk, says former federal bank regulator William Black, now an economics professor at the University of Missouri, Kansas City.

How does he view the derivative positions that have caused the bank a loss estimated at more than $3 billion?

"They didn't just gamble, this was a wild, crazy, insane gamble," Black tells Yahoo. "JPMorgan poses a clear and present danger to the global economy."

Editor's Note: I Wish I Were Wrong — Economist Laments Being Right. See Interview.

The largest U.S. bank isn’t just speculating on derivatives, he notes. It’s betting big on derivatives of derivatives too. JPMorgan is the largest player in at least two types of credit default swaps.

"We don't want any federal insured entity to be speculating in financial derivatives. That’s just nuts,” Black says.

"It's really disastrous when you're talking about an institution like JPMorgan. It will sooner or later have a really bad year. When it has the really bad year, we will all end up having to bail them out or having another global crisis."

JPMorgan’s speculative activity shows it has learned nothing from the financial crisis, Black says.

Others agree that JPMorgan went way too far.

“This was clearly a treasury department designed to maximize profit . . ., and they got burned,” Thomas Obermaier, CEO of bank consulting firm Regulatory DataCorp, tells Bloomberg. “It can eat a $3 billion loss. But you shouldn’t eat a $3 billion loss from treasury trading.”

Editor's Note: I Wish I Were Wrong — Economist Laments Being Right. See Interview.