Are Bankers Being Suicided?
Investment banker Kenneth Bellando, 28, was found dead March 12 on the sidewalk in front of the apartment building on Manhattan's East side where he lived. Police think he jumped from the roof of the six story building.
A former investment bank analyst at JP Morgan, Mr. Bellando had been working at Levy Capital since January. His brother, John, is a chief investment officer at JP Morgan.
Mr. Bellando is the 11th financial professional -- the 4th with ties to JP Morgan -- to die mysteriously in the last two months.
One of them, American Title Services president Richard Talley, 57, was found dead in the garage of his home in suburban Denver Feb. 7. Police have ruled his death a suicide. Mr. Talley shot himself in the head and torso eight times with a nail gun, police said. That's tough to do Suicide or suicided?
Document: JPMorgan Chase Bets $10.4 Billion on the Early Death of Workers
From Wall Street On Parade
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: March 24, 2014
(Left) JPMorgan's European Headquarters at 25 Bank Street, London Where Gabriel Magee Died on January 27 or January 28, 2014 Under Suspicious Circumstances
Families of young JPMorgan Chase workers who have experienced tragic deaths over the past four months, have been kept in the dark on many details, including the fact that the bank most likely held a life insurance policy on their loved one – payable to itself. Banks in the U.S., as well as other corporations, are allowed to make multi-billion dollar wagers that their profits from life insurance policies on employees will outstrip the cost of paying premiums and other fees. Early deaths help those wagers pay off.
According to the December 31, 2013 financial filing known as the Call Report that JPMorgan made with Federal regulators, it has tied up $10.4 billion in illiquid, long term bets on the death of a large segment of its employees.
The program is known among regulators as Bank Owned Life Insurance or BOLI. Federal regulators specifically exempted BOLI in passing the final version of the Volcker Rule in December of last year which disallowed most proprietary trading or betting for the house. Regulators stated in the rule that “Rather, these accounts permit the banking entity to effectively hedge and cover costs of providing benefits to employees through insurance policies related to key employees.” We have italicized the word “key” because regulators know very well from financial filings that the country’s mega banks are not just insuring key employees but a broad-base of their employees.
Just four of the largest U.S. banks, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Citigroup hold over $53 billion in investments in BOLI according to 2013 year-end Call Reports. Death benefits from life insurance is purchased at a multiple to the amount of the investments, meaning that $53 billion is easily enough to buy $1 million life insurance policies on 159,000 employees, and potentially a great deal more. Industry experts estimate that the total face amount of life insurance held by all banks in the U.S. on their employees now exceeds half a trillion dollars.
When the General Accountability Office (GAO) looked into the matter for Congress in 2003 and 2004, it found the insidious practice of continuing the life insurance even after the employee had left the company – nullifying any ability to consider him or her a “key” to the business. The GAO wrote: “Unless prohibited by state law, businesses can retain ownership of these policies regardless of whether the employment relationship has ended.” The GAO found that multiple companies held life insurance policies on the same individual.
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