While so many U.S. banks lie in tatters, or worse, because of exposure to the credit mess and their reckless acquisition binges during the bubble days, JPMorgan Chase stands apart. It's relatively unscathed.

Bank sector experts such as Mark Morgan of Thrivent Financial for Lutherans chalk it up to savvy leadership by JPMorgan's Jamie Dimon, who took the helm in late 2005. Dimon is a cautious banker with an eye for detail and a knack for surrounding himself with the best people. So he avoided big exposure to the risky credit instruments that took out Lehman Bros. and Bear Stearns and left so many other banks on the critical list. "Dimon saw the risk of getting into the bad businesses," Morgan says.

Plus, unlike Citigroup and Bank of America, JPMorgan didn't join in the acquisition frenzy when the financial bubble was inflating. Dimon focused instead on maintaining a solid balance sheet. That left JPMorgan in a position to swoop in and scoop up prizes after the crash. JPMorgan bought Bear Stearns and picked up Washington Mutual's attractive retail banking network on the cheap, for example. The Bear Stearns acquisition alone should eventually add $1 billion in annual revenue, JPMorgan says.

All of this helps explain why JPMorgan's stock has done better than shares of Citigroup, Bank of America and even Goldman Sachs Group in the past year.

JPMorgan does have problems, though: Credit card delinquencies are rising. Plus it has big exposure to risky derivatives, says Christopher Whalen, the managing director of Institutional Risk Analytics. So owning JPMorgan Chase stock now is a bet that its strong balance sheet can stand the test. Given how well Dimon has navigated turbulent waters so far, it probably will.

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