JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon delivers a speech through the International Markets Convention, forward of the Select France summit, in Paris, on Might 15, 2025.
Michel Euler | Afp | Getty Pictures
JPMorgan Chase is lastly permitting purchasers to purchase bitcoin. However CEO Jamie Dimon continues to be a skeptic.
“We’re going to will let you purchase it,” Dimon mentioned on the financial institution’s annual investor day on Monday. “We’re not going to custody it. We’ll put it in statements for purchasers.”
The choice marks a notable step for the biggest U.S. financial institution, significantly as a consequence of Dimon’s historical past of criticizing the digital forex and the crypto market broadly, and is the cinematic scene signal of bitcoin’s entry into mainstream investing. Since August, Morgan Stanley has allowed its monetary advisors to pitch some spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds to qualifying purchasers.
Dimon made it clear that his private view of bitcoin stays unchanged, highlighting points like cash laundering and the shortage of readability surrounding possession, together with “the intercourse trafficking, the terrorism.”
“I do not suppose it’s best to smoke, however I defend your proper to smoke,” Dimon mentioned. “I defend your proper to purchase bitcoin.”
A JPMorgan spokesperson declined to elaborate on the financial institution’s particular plans for bitcoin entry. Till now, the corporate has restricted its crypto publicity primarily to futures-based merchandise, not direct possession of bitcoin.
When crypto valuations have been hovering in 2021, Dimon dismissed bitcoin as “nugatory.” He told lawmakers during a Senate hearing in late 2023 that he is “all the time been deeply against crypto, bitcoin, and so forth.,” and that, “The one true use case for it’s criminals, drug traffickers … cash laundering, tax avoidance.” He mentioned on the listening to that, “If I used to be the federal government, I might shut it down.”
On the 2024 World Financial Discussion board in Davos, Dimon said, “Bitcoin does nothing. I name it the pet rock.” He added that, “That is the final time I am speaking concerning the with CNBC, so assist me God.”
Morgan Stanley CEO Ted Choose told CNBC at this 12 months’s occasion in Davos that the funding financial institution is exploring methods to deepen its involvement in cryptocurrency markets, navigating the regulatory panorama beneath the pro-crypto administration of President Donald Trump.
Since President Trump took workplace in January, the Federal Deposit Insurance coverage Company and Workplace of the Comptroller of the Forex have rescinded their anti-crypto steerage. Whereas banks can now custody crypto, due to the repeal of an accounting rule called SAB 121, they nonetheless face restrictions on working immediately with crypto companies with out specific approval from the Federal Reserve.
