In a conversation with a current and prominent J. P. Morgan Private Banker, several internal strategies for dealing with the current exodus were shared with us. To describe those strategies as ‘underwhelming’ would be exceptionally kind. It’s as if J. P. Morgan Private Bank leadership has never faced any actual ‘live bullets’ by way of competition.
To be more clear – they have no idea what they are doing.
Two strategies that were shared with us seemed so weak that we couldn’t believe them until they were explained even further: a conference call this week to discuss retaining top talent and 10% salary increases for top analysts (that was widely panned by the actual analysts).
To better understand the conference call later this week to ‘retain top talent’ – let’s break it down. This is a call by management at JPM PB to discuss WITH top talent how they’d like to be retained. This is how far behind the curve JPM PB leaders are. Nearly two months after massive teams in Dallas and San Francisco walked away from the firm (as well as Atlanta, Miami, NJ, CT, LA, etc etc) management is hosting a call to ask “well what do you guys think”. Omg! We expect a guy like Josh Navarro to have lots to say lol.
The other strategy had to do with paying lower-level employees at the Private Bank an extra $5k a year. Seriously? That’s an extra $400 a month, or about $280 after taxes. So not even enough for a decent meal once a month in most money center cities.
And you wonder why the mass exodus to UBS and Morgan Stanley isn’t about to slow down.
Remember we told you that David Frame (CEO of the Private Bank) is on the hot seat. That seat gets warmer by the day when the best he’s got is conference calls and “we promise to pay you more, trust us (but we won’t put it in writing).”
Just an FYI – when a JPM Private Banker moves to UBS they literally put the next 10-12 years of annual comp and bonuses in an actual contract. Not words, a contract. Read that again.
