JPMorgan names Dwyane Wade and Tom Brady in athlete wealth management campaign

JPMorgan Chase She has enlisted some of the biggest names in American sports to help address an ongoing problem: the bankruptcy of professional athletes.

The bank on Wednesday announced an initiative called the JPMorgan Chase Sports Council, led by two-time NBA Hall of Famer Dwyane Wade and featuring other notable athletes, including Tom Brady, Sue Bird, Alex Morgan, Megan Rapinoe, Aja Wilson and Jalen Brunson.

The stars will meet with JPMorgan executives to assist banking craft programs designed to serve athletes from college to career and retirement, JPMorgan said in a statement.

The move reflects the growing competition between banks and wealth managers to serve athletes, the most prominent of whom are increasingly becoming entrepreneurs, investors and media personalities.

Most athletes do not receive personal finance education in school, and their relatively short careers leave a narrow window of income that requires careful planning, according to JPMorgan, the largest U.S. bank by assets. The bank said that one in six NFL players declares bankruptcy within 12 years of retirement.

“We’ve been hearing a lot of the same thing over and over again, which is that a lot of young athletes are suddenly making money, developing unsustainable lifestyles, not always getting good advice around them, and these are the lucky ones,” Christine Lemkau, head of wealth management at JPMorgan, told CNBC’s Leslie Baker on Wednesday.

The initiative gives athletes an opportunity to share their hard-earned experiences with the next generation, Wade said in the statement.

“Getting the right educational resources and guidance is critical to making smart decisions about money as your career develops,” he said.

Wilson, a WNBA player, said it’s important for her to be able to share her money management skills with the next group of professional athletes.

“We started out trying to turn the page and help young people in the next generation understand that you have to build trust, you have to build boundaries and know exactly how you want to handle your money,” Wilson told CNBC.

The bank is also creating a Center of Sports Excellence with financial professionals with sports expertise and launching a content hub containing checklists for athletes navigating name, image and likeness, or NIL, and a system and guides for assembling a roster of advisors.

— CNBC’s Laia Neelakandan contributed to this report.