He’s baack! John Thain takes reins at CIT Group…
Happier Days
Hardly seems fair does it? Ken Lewis loses his spot at BofA, gets civil complaints filed against him by Cuomo, gets grilled by CongressCritters as attorneys drool on their TVs hoping for a magical shareholder class action suit, and Thain walks into a new CEO suite with hardly a scratch.
Vagaries of the dice toss or a deal with Beelzebub? Maybe it’s just that Ken is from Charlotte and John is from The Street? Must be his ‘Goldman’ parachute, heh. FD-MiM are Merrill/BofA shareholders….Our multitude of posts on the BofA Merrill merger and post merger brouhaha here..
Mashup by BluTaiger
John Thain has been chosen to run lender CIT, after a year in which he was ousted from Merrill Lynch and the business lender teetered on the brink. Thain will start as chairman and chief executive immediately, CIT said late yesterday, replacing interim head Peter Tobin.
Thain, 54, led Merrill for a year, when he was shoved out in January 2009 after the company was bought by Bank of America in a controversial merger. The former president of Goldman Sachs and the New York Stock Exchange has been out of work since. CIT, a major business lender that expanded into subprime mortgages and student loans during the boom, filed for bankruptcy last year after the government refused to give it a second infusion of rescue funds.
It emerged from bankruptcy in December, after managing to unload more than $10 billion in debt. “Much has been accomplished in recent months to position CIT for renewed success,” Thain said. CIT executives face compensation restrictions because it received funds from the Troubled Asset Relief Program. According to reports, Thain will receive $500,000 in salary and $5.5 million worth of restricted CIT shares. He could also earn another $1.5 million in restricted shares.
That’s a pittance compared to what he was making at Merrill Lynch. When he joined, the bank agreed to a $44 million compensation package…
You know who should pay the shareholder suits? STANLEY O’NEIL, he destroyed Merrill IMO….
Breaking: BofA to pay $33m penalty in settlement…SEC charges BofA with making material false stmts on Merrill deal…CIT Group shares halted for news pending….
Update 5: BofA Spokesman: Ken Lewis ABSOLUTELY has the full support of the Board…
Happier Days...
Update 4: BofA to pay $33 million penalty as part of settlement. Gee as a shareholder can I get part of that? Suuuure, after all WE are the wronged parties.. AS IF!
BofA is settling the charges, “without admitting or denying guilt”. Well now TAXPAYERS will wind up SOL when shareholders sue…after all we will not allow their capital ratios to fall….Pfft.
Developing via CNBC
Breaking II: Now SEC is charging BofA with making materially false, misleading statements in connection with the Merrill merger….oh boy….
We are shareholders. We have covered this extensively see our posts on Thain/Lewis here and here and here and here
This is NOT about the failure to use the Material Adverse Change clause to escape the merger, this is the bonus issue Cuomo was on top of…
From Mary Thompson CNBC:
SEC: BofA agreed to pay up to $5.8B in Merill bonuses, contrary to statements in the merger agreement…
Oh Andrew Cuomo must have gotten them in the depositions of Thain and Lewis, oh boy….
Hope to Good Lord it is news of a buyout or capital infusion of some magnitude and not a bankruptcy….
Our previous post on CIT Group here
Okay CIT Group just raised the purchase price on the tender offer.. no biggie.
Moderate in the Middle 