Bank on Banking

It’s official – Ken Lewis has announced his resignation as BofA Merrill Lynch CEO and Director, effective December 31, 2009. Although everyone must have been completely under the impression that big Kenny was ousted, news has it that this announcement came all-of-a-sudden and was entirely Lewis’ decision.

A successor for Lewis has not yet been named, but the Board is diligently looking (so they say) and plan to find a suitable replacement in the near future. The announcement, done in very quick fashion and without much of a plan in place naturally comes with questions. The main question, according to Gasparino is whether Lewis is really retiring because the SEC is close to making a decision to sue Mr. Lewis, personally, for the ML deal and such. Considering it has been recently reported that Lewis was not planning to step down, the argument…or question…is definitely one that carries some weight and validity. To be fair…if the SEC were about to sue me personally (they wouldn’t get much, but still), I’d definitely be running for the hills and out of harm’s way.

Lewis Heads for the Hills