About Us

Following the death of his father, Junius Morgan, and his business partner, A.J. Drexel, J. Pierpont Morgan reorganized the firm’s banking houses in the U.S., London and Paris. The New York firm was renamed J.P. Morgan & Co.

In an effort to shore up the U.S. gold reserves, J.P. Morgan & Co. formed a syndicate in 1895 to sell $65 million in gold bonds for the U.S. Treasury.

John Pierpont Morgan was a philanthropist and art collector as well as one of the country’s seminal financiers. His influence is still felt today, nearly a century after his death on March 31, 1913.

John Pierpont Morgan was born into a banking family. His father, Junius Spencer Morgan, was a partner at the London-based firm of George Peabody & Co. In 1864, Junius succeeded George Peabody and changed the firm’s name to J.S. Morgan & Co.

J.P. Morgan & Co. was selected by the U.S. Treasury Secretary to arrange the transfer of $40 million from the U.S. government to the Compagnie Nouvelle du Canal de Panamá (New Panama Canal Company) for its assets, including the right to build a canal.

J.P. Morgan & Co.'s partners helped finance Charles Lindbergh’s historic flight in 1927. Lindbergh carried with him a check drawn on the Equitable Trust Co. of New York, a JPMorgan Chase predecessor firm.

In July 1885, aboard his yacht, Corsair, J. Pierpont Morgan negotiated an agreement between two major East Coast railroad competitors, New York Central and Pennsylvania Railroad. The outcome was called the “Corsair Compact.”

In August 1858, England’s Queen Victoria sent the first transatlantic telegram to U.S. President James Buchanan. George Peabody and partner Junius Morgan, J. Pierpont Morgan’s father, were prominent investors in the cable project.

In September 1799, the Manhattan Company opened its doors at 40 Wall Street. The Bank of The Manhattan Company was the second commercial bank established in New York City.

During the financial panic of 1907, J. Pierpont Morgan saved from insolvency several trust companies and a leading brokerage house, bailed out New York City, and rescued the New York Stock Exchange.

In November 1879, private banking firm Drexel, Morgan & Co. successfully sold a block of William Vanderbilt's New York Central Railroad stock when he decided to liquidate his inheritance from his father, Cornelius Vanderbilt.

Following World War II, the firm became the first foreign bank to set up business again in Germany, and also one of the first to do so in Japan, thus expanding the firm’s international footprint and helping to build global linkages.