A Conversation with Distinguished Business Leader & Executive Michael Minikes:

Managing Director & Vice Chairman of
J.P. Morgan Prime Brokerage

Michael Minikes, '65, is a Managing Director and the Vice Chairman of J.P. Morgan Prime Brokerage.

Mr. Minikes began his business career at the CPA firm of Spicer & Oppenheim where he became a partner in 1972, specializing in the firm’s securities industry practice. There he played an active role in the development of federal securities regulations affecting broker-dealer financial requirements and became widely known for his expertise in that field.

Upon joining Bear Stearns in 1978, Mr. Minikes soon became a general partner and then a senior managing director when Bear Stearns Incorporated went public in 1986. He was a member of the firm’s Board of Directors and Operations Committee and he served as Treasurer of the Bear Stearns Companies until January 2008, when he became CEO of Bear Stearns Securities Corp.

Mike is associated with having helped build Bear Stearns’ extensive prime brokerage and broker-dealer correspondent clearing network and with bringing the company into the “banking” business, including with respect to the activities of Custodial Trust Company, a Bear Stearns Bank affiliate (now part of JP Morgan Chase Bank, NA). He was also instrumental in establishing Bear Stearns Securities Corp.
in 1991.

He is a former member of the Board of Directors of Depository Trust Company and the Securities Industry Automation Corp., and past Chairman of the Securities Industry Association Capital Committee.

An active host of charitable and community activities, Mr. Minikes is Senior Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Mount Sinai Medical Center, Trustee and the former Chairman of the Queens College Foundation, a member of the City University Business Leaders Council, and a member of the UJA Wall Street Strategic Council, in addition to many other organizations. In 2014, he was listed among Crain’s “Most Connected New Yorkers.”

Mr. Minikes is a graduate of Queens College (1965) and attended the NYU Graduate School of Business. He resides in Manhattan with his wife, Cheryl. They have two grown children and four grandchildren.