Coulda sworn I linked that when it happened but maybe I just texted mk, added a "LOL" and moved on. Regardless, I agree - it sort of is and it sort of isn't.

steve asserts that the headline is "blatant sensationalism." However, that's because the laundering has worked: I'll presume that from Steve's point of view, it's unfair to say that JP Morgan Chase are out running drugs. I will also presume that were Steve to run a shipping company, he would not knowingly take 20 tons of cocaine aboard. More than that, I suspect Steve would exert appropriate due diligence to ensure that his cargoes violated no maritime law. This a conventional choice, and a morally upstanding one.

The issue here is that the captain of the vessel is not the owner. The captain's boss is not the owner. Frankly, JP Morgan is not the owner, either - they neither manage MSC nor have anything to do with cargo. All they do is supervise the JP Morgan Alternative Infrastruture & Transport Fund, a product available primarily to endowments and pension funds. In other words, the likely owner of the vessel is us.

All the way along the line the ownership chain has been designed to wash away authority and concentrate profits. The people signing on to the fund care about two things: risk and yield. Yield has been low so these asset managers have been piling into risk because it's the only way to get the yields they owe.

So pension funds are now in the cocaine business. And it's absolutely nobody's fault, and nobody is to blame, and nobody has to feel bad about it. Right?