Search Results for: Epstein

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: September 14, 2023 ~ There may be a lesson here: don’t put the word “Republic” in the name of your bank; don’t hold a lot of uninsured deposits; and don’t have wads of unrealized losses on your investment securities. If those lessons sound familiar, it’s because they played out in stunning fashion earlier this year when the second, third and fourth largest bank failures in U.S. history occurred. One of those banks that blew up was First Republic Bank, which was put into FDIC receivership on May 1 and later sold, under much controversy, to the already behemoth JPMorgan Chase, the largest bank in the U.S. (JPMorgan Chase can’t seem to stay away from criminal charges. It thus far has notched five felony counts in its belt and is currently being sued by the U.S. Virgin Islands for “actively participating” in Jeffrey Epstein’s sex-trafficking of minors … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: September 11, 2023 ~ Last Thursday, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) released its Quarterly Banking Profile for the quarter ending June 30, 2023. The report includes the FDIC’s Problem Bank List. While the actual names of the problem banks aren’t provided, the total assets listed provide an indication of whether any large banks are on the list. The FDIC’s first quarter banking profile had published a “Problem Bank List” showing just 43 banks with total assets of $58 billion as of March 31, 2023. Unfortunately, on March 10 Silicon Valley Bank blew up with assets at year-end 2022 of $209 billion. Two days later, on March 12, Signature Bank blew up with assets of $110 billion as of year-end. Clearly, the FDIC did not see these as problem banks in advance of their blowing up in a matter of days. What the FDIC did know … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: August 31, 2023 ~ In much of the United States, if a person is convicted of a felony after conviction on two prior felonies, they receive a severe prison sentence. It’s known as the Three Strikes Law. But if you are the largest bank in the United States, charged by the U.S. Department of Justice with five felony counts since 2014, along with other major crimes for which you are given a non-prosecution agreement, not only do you not get harsher treatment for each new criminal act, but you actually get two federal law enforcement agencies doing damage control for you. We’re talking about JPMorgan Chase and its cozy relationship with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and certain officials within the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). Take, for example, what happened on June 22 of this year. The SEC issued a Cease-and-Desist order against the … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: August 16, 2023 ~ Yesterday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average took a tumble of 361 points by the closing bell. Numerous headlines attributed the big decline to a weakening economy in China. But the actual trigger for angst among traders was a headline at 5:30 a.m. EDT yesterday at CNBC. The headline read: “Fitch warns it may be forced to downgrade dozens of banks, including JPMorgan Chase.” JPMorgan Chase is not just the biggest bank in the United States in terms of assets and deposits. It is the biggest bank in terms of its derivative exposure. According to the federal regulator of national banks (those operating across state lines), the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), as of March 31, 2023, JPMorgan Chase Bank had assets of $3.2 trillion and derivative exposure of more than $59 trillion notional (face amount). The OCC report also … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: August 14, 2023 ~ In 2017, Simon & Schuster released the book, The Chickenshit Club, by the Pulitzer-prize winning public interest writer, Jesse Eisinger. The title derives from the premise that the prosecutors at the U.S. Department of Justice are too worried about losing a case or harming their ability to get those seven-figure pay packages at the big Wall Street law firms to do their jobs properly as prosecutors. Aside from that narrative, which is brilliantly analyzed by Eisinger, the book reveals a stunning fact about Manhattan federal district court Judge Jed Rakoff – a man who has gone out of his way to portray himself with the media as the protector of the public interest. Eisinger writes this: “Karp, sixteen years younger, and Rakoff began having dinner every several months, often with their wives and other lawyers, at restaurants around Manhattan: Il Gattopardo, … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: August 10, 2023 ~ That office space company we warned our readers about so extensively in 2019, WeWork, collapsed to 13 cents a share yesterday. Its bonds were trading at about 13 cents on the dollar. WeWork’s stock has been on a steady decline since the company began to trade publicly on October 21, 2021. The chart above shows how investors would have fared in WeWork stock versus a 10-year U.S. Treasury note since WeWork started trading in 2021. The collapse in the share price this week came as a result of an 8-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday in which the company uttered these discomforting words: “…as a result of the Company’s losses and projected cash needs, combined with increased member churn and current liquidity levels, substantial doubt exists about the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern.” The … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: August 7, 2023 ~ Deposits at the 25-largest domestically-chartered U.S. commercial banks peaked at $11.680 trillion on April 13, 2022, according to the updated H.8 data maintained at the Federal Reserve Economic Database (FRED). As of the most current H.8 data for the week ending on Wednesday, July 26, 2023, deposits stood at $10.709 trillion at those 25 commercial banks, a dollar decline of $970 billion and a percentage decline of 8.3 percent. Equally noteworthy, the decline shows no signs of letting up. According to the FRED data, between July 5 and the most current reading on July 26, the 25 largest U.S. banks shed $174 billion in deposits. Despite all of the misleading news reports about depositors seeking out the perceived safety of the largest banks since the banking crisis in the spring, it’s actually been the smaller banks that have staged a comeback … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: August 3, 2023 ~ At 5:13 p.m. ET on Tuesday, after the stock market closed, Fitch downgraded the U.S. credit rating from AAA to AA+. Fitch is now the second of the three major credit rating agencies to have taken the historic step of removing the triple-A rating from the U.S. S&P made its first-ever downgrade to the U.S. credit rating on August 5, 2011, also from AAA to AA+, and has kept it there ever since. Moody’s is now the only member of the Big Three credit rating agencies that has maintained a triple-A rating on the U.S. As the chart above indicates, the stock market responded negatively to this development yesterday, particularly over the fact that it came at a time when the U.S. Treasury is boosting the amount of debt it is issuing. Yesterday, the U.S. Treasury announced its plans to increase … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: July 31, 2023 ~ The chart above compares the stock price performance of the kidney dialysis company, DaVita (ticker DVA), with the Standard and Poor’s 500 Index since 1996. Right away, something looks very wrong. Why should a healthcare company delivering dialysis treatment to people with kidney failure make the kind of profits that would generate this outsized stock price return? Investigative reporter and author, Tom Mueller, has dedicated his latest book to pulling back the curtain on the dirty underbelly of this industry. The book, How to Make a Killing: Blood, Death and Dollars in American Medicine, will be available for sale in bookstores tomorrow. If you have a loved one receiving kidney dialysis at centers run by either DaVita or Fresenius, we urge you to stop what you’re doing, buy this book, and read it from cover to cover. The book presents nothing … Continue reading →

By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: July 25, 2023 ~ In June, Reuters reported that JPMorgan Chase was expanding the reach of its commercial bank into two additional foreign countries – Israel and Singapore – bringing its foreign commercial bank presence to a total of 28 countries. Those plans could potentially add billions of dollars more to its already problematic uninsured deposits. Why federal regulators are allowing JPMorgan Chase to continue to expand, despite it admitting to five criminal felony counts since 2014 and currently facing three lawsuits in federal court for facilitating Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking of underage girls is drawing attention from watchdogs. According to its regulatory filings, as of December 31, 2022, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. held $2.015 trillion in deposits in domestic offices, of which $1.058 trillion were uninsured. It also held another $418.9 billion in deposits in foreign offices, which were also not insured by the … Continue reading →