摩根大通230亿美元天价法律准备金引热议

    上周五，摩根大通（JPMorgan）表示，公司已备好230亿美元用于支付未来的罚款和法律账单。即便抛开资金规模，这样的披露也不寻常。银行通常不会透露它们为法律账单准备了多少钱。这也是摩根大通首次披露这一数字。

    银行业高管多年以来一直表示，他们不会披露这个数字，因为这样做可能导致他们遭遇更多诉讼，而且也不利于他们与监管机构的谈判。杰克•韦尔奇就在美国消费者新闻与财经电视频道（CNBC）上表示，公布这个数字是摩根大通CEO吉米•戴蒙的一步昏招。“现在，摩根大通成了块肥肉，”韦尔奇称，这位通用电气（GE）前CEO被视为是管理界泰斗。韦尔奇表示，现在监管机构和其他人都知道摩根大通会愿意付多少钱。

    但这种说法还是有点牵强。摩根大通只是表示为将来的法律账单及和解总共准备了多少钱，它可没说会为哪个案件付多少钱。它可以轻而易举地告知监管机构，这些钱是为其他案件准备的。上周五在摩根大通业绩发布后的记者电话会议上，戴蒙拒绝透露这230亿美元是为哪些案件设立的。

    而且，摩根大通不一定要花出这些钱。这些只是准备金。银行也总是回拨准备金。仅今年第三季度，摩根大通就从坏账准备金中拨回了19亿美元。

    分析师们早已对摩根大通的法律账单作出过估算。上周五，摩根大通宣布再增加92亿美元法律准备金前，摩根士丹利（Morgan Stanley）分析师贝特西•格拉塞克曾预测其法律准备金的规模为120亿美元。另一位分析师的预测为150亿美元。因此，实际数字与这些预测相当接近。

    不管怎样，戴蒙必然是迫于压力才发布实际数字的。因为有担忧认为，摩根大通尚未计提足够的准备金用于大规模和解。他可能感觉摩根大通计提了准备金，但未获外界认可。但这个数字的确表明，这家银行未来仍将面临相当数额的法律账单。

    坊间传言，摩根大通将向多家监管机构支付110亿美元，就一些指控达成和解。这些指控称，在金融危机即将爆发前，这家银行在抵押债品质方面误导了投资者。如果刨除这部分，摩根大通的准备金还剩下120亿美元。目前的摩根大通陷于多宗法律诉讼之中。但在摩根大通支付近10亿美元了结与伦敦鲸（London Whale）相关的指控，花近5亿美元了结加州能源价格操纵指控后，除了还有抵押债指控可能以110亿美元和解外，几乎没人认为摩根大通未来还会面临更多的巨额和解。

    参加上述电话会议的分析师们还在追问另一件怪事。除法律准备金外，银行通常会透露，可能要为法律账单超出准备金部分支付多少。尽管往准备金中增加了92亿美元，摩根大通给出的超额法律成本预测值仅下降了约10亿美元，减少到了57亿美元。摩根大通拒绝评论为什么这项数字没有出现更大幅度的下降，也没有届时这50多亿美元的缘由。

    不过，多少透露一点法律相关费用总好过绝口不提吧。

    On Friday, JPMorgan said that it had put aside $23 billion to cover future fines and legal bills. Even beyond the size, the disclosure was an unusual one. Banks don't typically say how much they have to cover legal bills. And it's the first time that JPMorgan has ever disclosed the number.

    Bank executives have long said they won't disclose the figure because it could open them up to more suits or hurt their negotiations with regulators. Indeed, Jack Welch on CNBC implied releasing the number was a silly move on CEO Jamie Dimon's part. "It's going to be open season," said Welch, the former CEO of GE, who is considered a management guru. Welch said regulators and others will now know how much JPMorgan will be willing to pay.

    But that excuse has always been a little weak. Just because JPMorgan is saying how much in total it would spend on its legal bills and settlements, it doesn't say anything about what it would spend on any one case. It could easily tell regulators that they money is committed to other cases. And indeed in a call with reporters following its earnings announcement on Friday, Dimon refused to say what the $23 billion was for.

    What's more, JPMorgan doesn't have to spend the money. It's just a reserve. And banks reverse reserves all the time. JPMorgan (JPM) took back $1.9 billion in loan loss reserves in the third quarter of this year alone.

    Analysts had already made their guesses about JPMorgan's legal bills. Morgan Stanley analyst Betsy Graseck estimated the legal reserve was $12 billion, before Friday's announcement that JPMorgan was going to add another $9.2 billion. Another analyst put it at $15 billion. So the actual number was pretty close.

    Nonetheless, Dimon must have felt compelled to release the actual number because of concerns that the bank hadn't put enough aside to cover large settlements. He may have felt that his bank was not getting credit for the money it had already put away. But the number does suggest that the bank still has significant legal bills ahead of it.

    It has been rumored that the bank will pay $11 billion to settle claims from a number of regulators that it misled investors about the quality of the mortgages it was selling in the run up to the financial crisis. That still leaves another $12 billion that JPMorgan expects to pay out. JPMorgan is in the middle of a number of legal battles. But having paid nearly $1 billion to settle charges related to the London Whale, and nearly $500 million for manipulating energy prices in California, few thought JPMorgan, beside the $11 billion for mortgages, had that many more big ticket settlements still ahead of it.

    Analysts on the conference call also pounced on another oddity. On top of legal reserves, banks typically say how much they might have to pay in legal bills above what they have put away in reserves. Despite adding $9.2 billion to its reserves, JPMorgan's estimate of excess legal costs only dropped by about a billion to $5.7 billion. JPMorgan executives declined to comment why that number hadn't dropped more, and what that additional $5 billion could be for.

    Still, a little bit of light on legal fees is better than nothing.