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Transcript of Jamie Dimon Urges US To Engage With China

Read the full transcript of a conversation between Financial Times editor Roula Khalaf and JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, April 14, 2025.

The interview starts here:

Introduction and China Relations

ROULA KHALAF: I’m in New York at the JPMorgan Chase headquarters and my guest today is Jamie Dimon. Jamie Dimon, good to have you on FT video. You are one of the most influential voices in corporate America. And JPMorgan Chase, of course, is the largest bank on Wall Street and Main Street. Last week, President Trump cited your comments as influential in his decision to pause some tariffs. What advice would you have for the Chinese authorities now to ease the trade war? What would you be telling them?

JAMIE DIMON: First of all, welcome. Thrilled to be here. I do read the FT every single day, and I have for two or three decades at this point. I try to just be honest about everything we think. I try to do deep work and deep analysis. And there’s a section in my shareholder letter about China.

I think China in reality has done a lot of good things for its own nation. I don’t agree with autocratic dictatorships, et cetera, but they lifted a nation that had a GDP per person of $400 to $15,000. That compares to $85,000 in America. But there are legitimate complaints that people have around China. If you look at their neighborhood, very complex neighborhood, but they are scaring Japan, Korea, Indonesia, Vietnam, India, et cetera.

They should look at themselves and look at where the legitimate complaints about trade are. A lot of nations around the world think that they’ve been dumping excess capacity on their nations and they should look at all of that.

What I said in my letter is that America shouldn’t be afraid. America has a wonderfully strong hand with all of our freedoms and prosperous nation, that we should work with our allies, which is exactly what China doesn’t want. But I think China and America should engage. They’ve started to, but right now they’re not talking very much. I think the first thing you do when you sit down with anyone is say, how’s your family? What are your objectives? You know, we all have common interests.

ROULA KHALAF: And do you think the president should call Xi Jinping and ask about his family?

JAMIE DIMON: I’m going to leave it up to them how they go about it, but I don’t want to get this tit for tat type of thing. I think adults should talk to each other and listen to each other and acknowledge when the other person is right or at least has a good point.

ROULA KHALAF: I did notice in your letter that you called for respectful, strong and consistent engagement with China, but that’s not where we are today, is it?

JAMIE DIMON: I don’t think we have any engagement right now. But that can start tomorrow. It doesn’t have to wait a year, can start tomorrow. You start with a phone call. Either president can assign it to someone to call them up and go see them. We’ve done that with Iran, which I think is good.

On Decoupling from China

ROULA KHALAF: Do you think that a decoupling by the U.S. is it possible to decouple from China today?

JAMIE DIMON: I think over time it’s definitely possible. If you said that’s what our objective is, I don’t think that should be the objective. I think from the United States standpoint, my objective would be anything that relates to national security. Obviously America should rely on itself or close allies for that. Anything that’s about really unfair trade, that should be dealt with. That’s true with a lot of nations. There’s a lot of unfair trade all over the place. This has been going on for 100 different years.

But a lot of things don’t matter as much. You know, where you get your textiles made, your footwear, your furniture. So I think we should be clear eyed about what we’re trying to accomplish. And I also think we should do it with allies. I think if the Western world, I would want to negotiate eventually with Europe, with the UK, with Japan, Korea, Australia, Philippines and have a very strong economic relationship and also then face off with China and say, we want to trade with you, but here are the terms of trade that we all think are fair and reasonable.

The Western Alliance

ROULA KHALAF: I think your whole point about alliances was something that you made very clear in your letter. There is a feeling when I talk to people around the world, governments and businesses, that today it is the US itself that is undermining the post world order that it has created. How do you get around that? What do you think should happen now?

JAMIE DIMON: I think the most important thing is that we don’t read a book in 40 years how the West was lost. I think it’s one thing for any nation or the United States to say, I think this is unfair around trade, around the cost of military. I think there’s some very good points which I think Europe knows that they need to spend more on their military. But that does not mean we shouldn’t have a military alliance with Europe in general.

And same with the economy. They need to do more. The GDP per person in Europe has dropped from something like 70% of America, to like 50%. That’s not sustainable. I think Europe has already recognized it needs to change its own rules, regulations and guidelines if they want to grow faster. And I think that’s true, but it should be done with us. The goal should be, in my view, to strengthen Europe and get them closer, not to get them weaker and get them further.

I think fragmentation of the world is a bad idea. Fragmentation of the Western world and you can end up with the world looking like before World War I and World War II, which was almost every nation for themselves trying to figure out how they’re going to protect themselves. And unfortunately that might lead to proliferation of nuclear weapons.

ROULA KHALAF: What are the consequences for JPMorgan Chase of this potential fragmentation?

JAMIE DIMON: Well, I think from a company standpoint, Warren Buffett talks about the resiliency of America.