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: Dimon, Blankfein, Mack to Testify to Crisis Panel

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aR02WG2lDCLc&pos=5#

By Lorraine Woellert

Dec. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Jamie Dimon, chief executive officer of JPMorgan Chase & Co., will be among the first witnesses to testify before a commission investigating last year’s financial collapse.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Chairman and CEO Lloyd Blankfein and Morgan Stanley Chairman and CEO John Mack also have agreed to testify at next month’s inaugural hearing of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, said Chairman Phil Angelides.

Bank of America Corp.’s new CEO, Brian Moynihan, has been invited and is expected to appear as well, Angelides said.

“We have requested the appearance of key leaders who have been involved in the financial crisis,” Angelides said in a telephone interview. “There’s no question that these institutions were at the center of this storm, not to make any prejudgments about their role in it.”

Commission Vice Chairman Bill Thomas, who also was on the phone call, said the witnesses will be followed by testimony from academics and others over the course of the two-day hearing.

“It hard to say where you should begin,” Thomas said. The witness list “was appropriate to set the tone and the direction, but we aren’t just bringing people in to give their story and leave.”

Hearing Jan. 13-14

The commission was created by Congress to examine the causes of a collapse that roiled global markets and led to a $700 billion U.S. government bailout of the nation’s banks. The panel will question the executives at the hearing, to be held in Washington Jan. 13 and 14.

Bank of America spokesman Lawrence Di Rita said in an e- mail that the company is in a transition period and looks forward to working with the commission. Bank of America this month announced that Moynihan would take the company reins as of Jan. 1, replacing Chief Executive Officer Kenneth Lewis, who will retire Dec. 31.

Goldman and Morgan Stanley officials didn’t return calls requesting comment.

The crisis panel will hear from “hundreds” of witnesses over the next year, Angelides said. “We’ll be calling private- and public-sector folks who over the course of the last two years have been involved in the center of this crisis,” he said.

$8 Million Budget

The 10-member commission, led by Angelides, a Democrat and former California treasurer, and Thomas, a Republican and former U.S. House member from California, is armed with an $8 million budget and subpoena power. It plans hearings until September and a report by next December.

Congress created the panel to examine the causes of the financial implosion, including the role of regulators and corporations. The group will examine subprime lending, credit- rating companies, executive pay and other activities, Angelides said. The Obama administration has directed regulators to cooperate with its requests for information.

The goal is to review the public record of events that led to the failure of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. in 2008 and helped trigger the collapse.

To contact the reporter on this story: Lorraine Woellert in Washington at [e-mail].

Last Updated: December 23, 2009 17:18 EST