It seemed an aberration at the time, but in 2013, JPMorgan Chase alone paid $20 billion in fines. Since that bank was Obama’s most important early campaign backer, and since not a single major executive, there or elsewhere, was ever jailed for what, to judge from the size of the fines, would have been the largest financial crimes in history, it is natural to wonder whether this fining arrangement was disciplinary or collusive.
