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Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase, has never been one to pull any punches. So it comes as no surprise that he had a lot to say — and bluntly so — about a lot of urgent issues facing the U.S. and the world during his keynote appearance at the 2025 SIEPR Economic Summit.

On signals in the U.S. and global economy: “It’s all inflationary,” he said, pointing to several factors including huge government deficits, high home and other asset prices, excess cash from government payouts to consumers during the pandemic, the urgent need for more military defense spending given geopolitical threats, and the prospect of tariff wars.

“The notion that [interest rates] won’t go up is a little crazy,” Dimon said of the widespread view that they would never go to, say, 8 percent. People assumed in the late 1970s that interest rates wouldn’t go high — until they did. “And if you look at the factors driving inflation then, they look to be far worse today.”

Wait until summer, Dimon said. That’s when he thinks there will be a lot more clarity on what’s happening with the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, fraying economic ties between the U.S. and China, and America’s fiscal outlook as Congress considers extending the sweeping tax cuts made during President Trump’s first term in office.

“If those things [don’t] go well,” he said, “I think you could see a serious reaction” that could lead to a U.S. recession.

But the economic outlook isn’t what concerns Dimon most. “I’m much more worried about the geopolitics than I am about the economy,” he said. Among other challenges, he said the U.S. needs to work with its allies to prevent Russia and China from dismantling NATO, the European Union and other multilateral systems.

“Our country’s adversaries want to go to a bilateral world,” said Dimon, adding: “I’m not against ‘America First,’ but we cannot be ‘America alone.’”

Bullish on the office, AI

Dimon spoke, too, about what led to the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic Bank — JPMorgan acquired the latter — and how bureaucratic red tape, in government and in companies, is bad for business and the economy.

He also defended JPMorgan’s return-to-office mandate for the majority of the bank’s workers as of March 1. The move was necessary for many reasons, he said, including the harm that hybrid work was having on younger workers who missed out on mentorship opportunities, relationship-building and work assignments.

“It’s not the same on Zoom,” he said, likening the experience to the American game show Hollywood Squares. “You look at these Hollywood Squares and half the time people are [looking at their phones] which I consider disrespectful.”

Dimon was much more positive about another technology — artificial intelligence — and how it’s transforming JPMorgan for the better. The bank already has about 50 use cases for AI, and Dimon says he expects that to grow to 1,000 in a year or so. “Every time I go to a business review at any level, [I ask] ‘What are you doing in AI?’”

AI will affect “every single job,” he said, and some will be lost. But that’s inevitable with any technological advance, he said. “The [invention of the] tractor eliminated jobs,” he said.

Highlights of the 2025 SIEPR Economic Summit

Photos by Ryan Zhang.