The British woman competing to run the world's biggest bank
When Marianne Lake came second on American Banker's list of the most powerful women in finance, she joked that it was better to come in third place, as she had the year before.
'By my estimation, being number three is a pretty sweet spot,' she quipped to the audience of Wall Street high-flyers at the 2015 event. 'You've placed, you're on the podium, you get a medal, and you get to sit down and drink through the speeches.'
Lake may not have favoured the limelight then, but soon it would be inescapable. Today, the Briton is one of the frontrunners in the race to succeed Jamie Dimon as chief executive of JP Morgan, the biggest bank in the US and one of the biggest in the world.
The job would see her lead a Wall Street titan that employs over 300,000 staff while serving more than 82m customers both in the US and the UK.
Lake, 55, would also be stepping into the shoes of a giant. Dimon, 69, has worked as JP Morgan's chief executive since 2006, helping the bank not just survive the financial crisis, but thrive in its aftermath. Its share price has increased almost 600pc since Dimon took charge.
JP Morgan's chief is widely regarded as one of the world's most influential financiers. He was floated as Donald Trump's potential treasury secretary, and Dimon has toyed with running for the presidency himself in the past. When Dimon speaks, his words carry weight well beyond Wall Street.
Lake, who runs JP Morgan's consumer & community banking division, is one of a small group of senior executives who have been identified as potential candidates to succeed Dimon when he chooses to step down.
If she were to step into his shoes, Lake would become the first woman to lead JP Morgan in its 154-year history, as well as becoming its first British chief too. Could she make history and move from number two to the top spot?
Born to a British father and an American mother, Lake moved from Cumberland, Maryland – a small US city of less than 20,000 people – to the UK, aged two. Her father was a computer programmer and her mother an airline ticketing agent.
Lake studied physics at Reading University before starting her career at PwC in London. She moved to the accounting giant's Sydney offices, before joining JP Morgan in 1999 at the age of 30.
She quickly rose through the ranks to be named chief financial officer of the consumer & community banking division in 2009, dealing with more than 82m of JP Morgan's retail customers.
'It's really smart to have a strong contender with a 'Main Street' point of view, given the role that banks play in real people's lives,' says Sandra Sucher, an economist at Harvard Business School.
Unlike rivals such as Goldman Sachs that focus on investment activities, JP Morgan also offers bank accounts and loans to millions of ordinary citizens. It is part of what makes the bank so huge, and the job of running it so influential.
Lake's main rivals in the succession battle are Douglas Petno and Troy Rohrbaugh, both co-chief executives of JP Morgan's commercial and investment bank – the Wall Street side of the ledger.
Lake recently had her own position expanded to cover the responsibilities formerly held by Sanoke Viswanathan, an executive who has now left JP Morgan to join FactSet, a financial data provider. Many took it as a sign she could be being lined up to take the top job.
The Briton has acknowledged that she might not 'fit the typical profile' of a top banker at JP Morgan, given she spent her formative years outside of the US and did not attend an Ivy League school or Oxbridge.
However, Glenn Schorr, a banking analyst at Evercore, says there's 'no chance' anyone would see Lake as an outsider after 'spending more than three minutes with her'.
'I don't think anybody's ever said a bad word about her,' says Schorr, who has known Lake for over a decade. 'She's charming to be around. She has an insane command for the subject matter. She's got the full package.'
Lake wouldn't be the first British woman to lead a Wall Street bank. Jane Fraser, who runs Citibank, was born in St Andrews, Scotland.
Her background is, however, more traditional Wall Street: Fraser studied economics at Cambridge before working in the mergers and acquisitions unit of Goldman Sachs, later completing an MBA at Harvard Business School.
JP Morgan insiders described Lake as a 'big success story' and said people within the bank were 'very enthusiastic about her chances of becoming the next Jamie Dimon'.
To her advantage, Lake has worked closely with JP Morgan's chief for years. She told Marie Claire in 2013: 'Our offices are right next door, and we're in and out of each other's offices multiple times a day. Every Friday night we try to sit down together and go over things, but it's not always necessary. We're usually on the same page.'
Gerard Cassidy, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said Lake has 'done a very good job in her role'.
He described Lake as 'pretty forward' and 'direct', and someone who 'demands and receives a high level of production from the people that she works with'.
'You can tell that she has a high level of expectations for the people that work for her.'
Lake's high status within the bank is reflected in her pay. She earned $18.5m in 2024, making her the fourth-best remunerated executive behind Dimon; Daniel Pinto, JP Morgan's president; and Mary Erdoes, the chief executive of JP Morgan's wealth management business, who may also have a shot at the top job.
Lake now lives in New York, having moved to the US in 2004. In February, local newspaper Crain's New York Business reported she had moved into a four bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, said to have been purchased for more than $13m.
Schorr describes Lake as a fast talker with an extensive knowledge of the bank. 'It feels like she knows everything about everything,' he says, adding that JP Morgan's major shareholders hold her in the 'highest regard'.
'I'm not going to pretend it's easy'
The executive has given relatively few interviews to the media and was unavailable to speak for this piece. It means there are few clues as to what direction she might take JP Morgan in, if she were to rise to the position of chief executive.
One thing she has opened up about publicly is her decision to have her three children in her 40s, through a surrogate, raising them on her own.
'I'm not going to pretend it's easy,' Lake told the audience at American Banker's gala in 2015. 'But, like everything in life, to make it work you need to be highly organised.'
In her interview with Marie Claire, Lake said: 'I never worried about raising a kid on my own. I'm 42, not 20 with my eyes closed. The circumstances aren't traditional, but I didn't hesitate to do it.'
Lake has also championed diversity. In her 2015 speech at American Banker's gala, the executive said she had made an effort to surround herself with a 'diverse team ... with respect to experience, background and thinking.'
'Should my daughter decide to follow in my footsteps and enter this great industry, I would like to believe that she would have all the same opportunities that her brothers would, and that I would like to do everything I can to ensure that that is the case,' she said.
Lake's rise comes at a time when Donald Trump is fighting an all-out war on the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies that have become widespread throughout America's largest firms.
JP Morgan itself recently relaunched its DEI initiatives, replacing the word 'equity' with 'opportunity', in a rebrand of the programme under a new name, 'DOI'. Whether this is enough to escape the president's ire remains to be seen.
Regardless, Lake may not have to deal with Trump, even if she does get the top job. The board of JP Morgan handed Dimon a $50m retention bonus in 2021 that would keep him in the top job until at least the middle of next year, and he said this week that his retirement was 'several years away'. Still, he has also admitted that succession planning is 'well under way'.
While she may still face a wait, Lake could soon become JP Morgan's first female chief – and one of the most prominent Britons on Wall Street. The limelight is calling.
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