John Thain
| John Thain | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born |
John Alexander Thain May 26, 1955 Antioch, Illinois, U.S. |
| Alma mater |
Massachusetts Institute of Technology Harvard University |
| Political party | Republican |
John Alexander Thain (born May 26, 1955) is an American businessman, investment banker, and formerchairman and CEO of the CIT Group.
Thain was the last chairman and chief executive officer of Merrill Lynch before its merger with Bank of America. He was designated to become president of global banking, securities, and wealth management at the newly combined company, but resigned on January 22, 2009. Ken Lewis, CEO of Bank of America, reportedly forced Thain to step down after several controversies, such as the losses at Merrill Lynch which proved to be far larger than previously estimated, and the award of huge executive bonuses.
Before he came to Merrill, Thain had been the CEO of the from January 2004 to December 2007. He also worked at Goldman Sachs, as head of its mortgage securities division from 1985 to 1990, and president and co-chief operating officer from 1999 to 2004.
Thain reportedly was one of the runners-up to head Citigroup. Merrill Lynch and Citigroup sought new leaders following the sudden departure of their former CEOs after the disappointing performance in the third quarter of 2007 due to the subprime mortgage crisis.
Thain arranged the sale of Merrill to Bank of America at $29 per share, a 70 percent premium over the market price. The deal valued the brokerage at $50 billion. Thain was expected to be president of global banking, securities and wealth management, a new division at Bank of America, to oversee its corporate and investment bank and most of wealth management business.
In December 2003, interim chairman John Reed at the told The Wall Street Journal that Thain would be paid "a plain vanilla number", about $4 million a year including bonus, with no "strange retirement" program like the one former NYSE CEO Dick Grasso was given.
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