How Thundering Merrill Faltered and Fell

John A. Thain, a former Goldman Sachs executive who was also head of the New York Stock Exchange, was hired as Merrill’s chief executive to try to clean up Mr. O’Neal’s mess. But multibillion-dollar losses kept piling up, and Merrill was hard pressed to raise enough to replenish its coffers.

“None of the trading businesses should be taking risks, either single positions or single trades, that wipe out the entire year’s earnings of their own business,” Mr. Thain said in January. “And they certainly shouldn’t take a risk to wipe out the earnings of the entire firm.”

A month later, Mr. Fakahany left Merrill. Upon his departure, in a statement that Merrill issued, he said: “I leave knowing that the firm’s financial condition is significantly enhanced and the new team is in place and moving forward.”

Mr. Fakahany continued to receive a Merrill salary until the end of this summer; he does not appear to have received an exit package.

Mr. Thain, meanwhile, sold off assets for whatever price he could get to try to salvage the firm. In August, he arranged a sale of $31 billion of Merrill’s C.D.O.’s to an investment firm for 22 cents on the dollar. For the first nine months of this year, Merrill recorded net losses of $14.7 billion on its C.D.O.’s. Through October, some $260 billion of asset-backed C.D.O.’s have started to default.

As the depth of Merrill’s problems emerged, its shares plummeted. With Lehman on the verge of collapse, Wall Street began to wonder if Merrill would be next.

Some banks were so concerned that they considered stopping trading with Merrill if Lehman went under, according to participants in the Federal Reserve’s weekend meetings on Sept. 13 and  14.

The following Monday, Merrill — torn apart by its C.D.O. venture — was taken over by Bank of America.

Copyright © 2012 The New York Times

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