为什么放走摩根大通“伦敦鲸”

    “伦敦鲸”生生不息。

    美国政府称，摩根大通（JPMorgan Chase）的60亿美元（370.2亿元人民币）交易损失与员工的欺诈行为有关。这样的判断将在华尔街引起前所未有的反响，而它的最奇妙之处不在于谁受到了指控，而在于谁没有受到指控。

    长期担任首席投资官的艾娜•德鲁是促使摩根大通更敢于冒险的人，而且对公司的交易情况了如指掌，但她一项罪名也没有（为什么不指控她监督不力呢？）。首席执行官杰米•戴蒙也是如此。虽然不清楚具体亏损数额，但戴蒙清楚“伦敦鲸”的交易规模。即便如此，他仍对投资者说“伦敦鲸”事件是“小题大做”。戴蒙还在有问题的账目上签了字，但最终摩根大通不得不重述这些账目。按照《萨班斯-奥克斯利法案》（Sarbanes Oxley Act），高管应该对此负责。摩根大通多名负责风险控制的管理人员也没有受到牵连。他们批准了对风险模型的调整，让这笔前景堪忧的交易越变越大。与此同时，摩根大通的账目则显示，这家公司正在降低交易风险。

    同样平安无事的还有摩根大通公司本身。美国证券交易委员会（SEC）表示，该机构的调查仍在进行之中。监管部门也已要求摩根大通加强风险控制。但摩根大通似乎认为美国政府只会小小地惩罚它一下。

    还记得“伦敦鲸”布鲁诺•伊克希尔吗？没错，作为这些失败交易的实际操作者，他同样逃过了一劫。

    美国司法部和SEC对哈维尔•马丁-阿塔霍和朱利安•格鲁的指控让我们有机会窥见现如今成为华尔街交易员的奇妙之处，特别是那些掌握着数十亿美元最危险资产的交易员。马丁-阿塔霍是伊克希尔的顶头上司，格鲁则是伊克希尔的下属，他负责对伊克希尔的投资进行估值并计算盈亏。

    当时，这三个人处于危急关头，而且面对着从业以来最困难的交易局面，但政府指控书公布的三人之间的详细对话让人感到意外。2012年初，他们的损失有扩大的趋势，但他们中间没有任何一个人提出通过买卖债券或衍生产品来尽量减少损失，或者说进行交易。实际上，马丁-阿塔霍似乎希望在尽可能长的时间里继续持有这笔组合投资，此时其面值已达到1,570亿美元（9686.9亿元人民币）。而这样做并不是交易。

    相反，提交给法院的文件表明，这三名交易员用了大量时间（不知道是不是他们的全部时间）来讨论价值和账面数字。也就是他们持有的哪些资产有价值，以及如何让损失看起来尽可能的小。最初他们只是进行了细微调整。到了最后，格鲁计算的实际损失和他们向上报告的数字之间的差距已高达8亿美元（49.36亿元人民币）。关键时刻，也就是今年第一季度的最后一天，马丁-阿塔霍告诉格鲁，他希望账面上的日亏损额只有2亿美元（12.34亿元人民币），尽管他们当天的新增亏损都可能比这个数字大得多。格鲁按他说的做了，马丁-阿塔霍随后又问能不能把损失降到1.5亿美元（9.26亿元人民币）。最终，他们报告的日损失额为1.38亿美元（8.51亿元人民币）。

    这次事件接近尾声时，摩根大通负责风险控制的管理人员确实找过马丁-阿塔霍，而且要求他解释相关投资的入账方法。对此，马丁-阿塔霍的回答大概是：“嘿，我可不是会计。”可以看到，这个借口相当滑稽，因为这几个家伙似乎一直在做账，只是他们做的不合法规。

    Long live the Whale.

    The most fascinating thing about the government's charge that JPMorgan Chase employees committed fraud in connection with the bank's $6 billion trading loss, and the one that will have the largest reverberations for Wall Street, is not who is being charged, but who isn't.

    Ina Drew, the long-time head of the chief investment office and the person who pushed the bank to take on more risk and was well aware of the trades, does not stand accused of any wrongdoing. (Why not charge her with failure to supervise?) Nor is JPMorgan's CEO Jamie Dimon, who told investors the issue of the London Whale was "a tempest in a teapot" even after he was alerted to the size of trade, if not an accurate picture of the losses. Dimon also signed off on JPMorgan's faulty books, which eventually had to be restated, something Sarbanes Oxley was supposed to hold executives accountable for. Nor are any of the bank's multiple risk officers who signed off on the change in the risk model that allowed the London Whale's ill-fated trade to get bigger, even as the bank's books appeared to show that JPMorgan was reducing its trading risks.

    Also getting off mostly scot-free is JPMorgan (JPM). The SEC says its investigation is continuing. And regulators have already ordered the bank to improve its risk controls. But it appears JPMorgan is looking at a minor slap on the wrist.

    And remember the London Whale himself, Bruno Iksil, the actual architect of the ill-fated trades? Yeah, he's off the hook as well.

    The Justice Department and the SEC's cases against Javier Martin-Artajo and Julien Grout, the two who are being charged, give an amazing window into what it's like to be a trader these days on Wall Street, especially the ones who are responsible for multi-billion dollar portfolios of the market's riskiest stuff. Martin-Artajo was Iksil's direct boss. Grout worked under Iksil, and was responsible for valuing Iksil's portfolio, computing the gains or losses.

    The conversations detailed in the government's complaints are not what you would expect from three guys in the heat of the market, facing the most difficult trade of their careers. In early 2012, when the losses appeared to be mounting, there was no discussion by any of the three about what bonds or derivatives they might sell or buy to minimize their losses -- also known as trading. In fact, Martin-Artajo seems to be driven by a desire to keep the synthetic portfolio, which had grown by this time to have a notional value of $157 billion, as is for as long as possible. That is not a trade.

    Instead, according to the court filings, the three traders spend a lot of time (all of their time?) talking about valuations and marks. What are the trades they have worth, and how can they make the losses they've got look as small as possible. It starts off as minor tweaking. By the end, Grout is maintaining a spreadsheet showing the traders' actual losses are as much as $800 million more than what they are reporting up the chain. In one telling moment, on the last day of the first quarter, Martin-Artajo tells Grout that he wants to show a daily loss of just $200 million, even though it's likely the portfolio had sunk that day alone much more than that. When Grout does this, Martin-Artajo goes back and asks whether they can get the loss number down to $150 million. The daily loss they end up reporting: $138 million.

    Late in the game a JPMorgan risk officer does catch up with Martin-Artajo and asks him to explain the way the portfolio is marked, to which Artajo responds basically, "Hey, I ain't no accountant." And that you know is a pretty funny excuse because all these guys seem to be doing is accounting, but not actually a legal one.