Bloomberg: Dimon’s Annual Meeting Brings Apologies, Protesters on Mortgages

Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM)’s chairman and chief executive officer, said he was sorry for foreclosure mistakes as hundreds of protesters at the annual meeting demanded he do more to help homeowners and small businesses recover from the financial crisis.

For any errors that were made, “we deeply apologize,” Dimon, 55, said today at the shareholders’ meeting in a 2- million-square-foot office building in Columbus, Ohio. “We are doing everything we can to keep people in their homes that should stay in their homes.” Dimon said he especially regretted the bank’s mistakes in foreclosing on active-duty military personnel and for fumbling paperwork on other home seizures.

JPMorgan and other large U.S. banks are feeling the backlash from the housing bust, with mortgage losses and related litigation suppressing earnings and regulators investigating industry practices. The U.S. Justice Department is suing Deutsche Bank AG for more than $1 billion, and has said it may go after other lenders for filing false claims for federal mortgage insurance on faulty loans.

JPMorgan’s record $5.56 billion in profit during the first quarter was tempered by “extraordinarily high losses we still are bearing on mortgage-related issues,” Dimon said last month. JPMorgan’s $17.4 billion in net income last year made it the most profitable bank in the U.S.

“Everyone is hurting, it seems like, except for Wall Street and its executives,” said Jordan Estevao, who helped lead demonstrations outside the meeting for National People’s Action, a non-profit consumer advocacy group. ...

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