Jamie Dimon predicts consumers will exhaust their pandemic savings by Christmas - and warns of much greater threats than recession
- Jamie Dimon is far more concerned about global threats than a US recession.
- He's worried about the Russia-Ukraine war, nuclear blackmail, and disruptions to key supply chains.
Many people are fretting about a possible recession, but Jamie Dimon is far more worried about other global threats, he told The Economist in an interview released on Tuesday.
The JPMorgan CEO predicted American households would exhaust their pandemic savings around the end of this year, paving the way for a slump in consumer spending and an economic slowdown. But he asserted that increases in wages, home values, and stock prices over the past 10 to 15 years would lessen the pain caused by a downturn.
"Even if we go into recession, consumer's in great shape," Dimon said, adding that was broadly true for businesses too.
The billionaire banker defended his warning last spring that "storm clouds" were gathering on the horizon. Inflation surged to a historic high, the stock market tumbled, and the IPO market effectively closed last year, he noted. The American economy could still hit a major bump, he added, before noting he has bigger concerns.
"I'm much more worried about some of these other serious things getting worse," he said. "The war in Ukraine spreading out, nuclear blackmail, food doesn't get delivered, starvation in Africa. I'm far more worried about that."
The bank chief also listed disruption to global energy supplies, severe economic woes in several small countries, inflation surging again, and the unknown impact of quantitative tightening and easing on an unprecedented scale. He acknowledged those risks could dissipate, but cautioned, "I wouldn't count on that."
The JPMorgan boss first sounded the alarm on the global economic outlook more than a year ago. He reeled off a slew of international headwinds during an earnings call last summer, and cautioned in April that banking-sector turmoil could worsen any fallout.