JPMorgan: Steering clear?

It's a bit much to ask for a bank to steer completely clear of the mortgage-backed meltdown right now. All are being hit. JPMorgan wrote down $1.3 billion in subprime-related debts and reported an earnings drop of 21 percent for the fourth quarter. Credit remains the big issue going forward. But all in all, Jaime Dimon and company can thank their gods that they haven't been hit as hard as Citigroup has. Management deserves a lot of credit. Most notably, they decided to eschew structured investment vehicles, the real Achilles heel of Citigroup right now. According to the Financial Times, in 2003, when JPMorgan bought Bank One, it inherited a London-based SIV. After looking at the prospects, it decided to sell. It is now being unwound by its new owners. It also remained a minor player in the mortgage-backed portion of the CDO market.  

For more:
- here's an AP article on earnings
- here's a look at its ability to steer clear, also from the Financial Times