Summary Box: SEC, NY attorney general at odds over reasons for firing of BofA top lawyer
By APWednesday, February 17, 2010
Summary Box: At odds over BofA firing
BOFA TOP LAWYER FIRED: In December 2008, before its takeover of Merrill Lynch, Bank of America Corp. abruptly fired its general counsel Timothy Mayopoulos.
SEC VS CUOMO: The Securities and Exchange Commission says Mayopoulos’s firing was done just to make way for another executive, and not because he had given Bank of America legal advice it didn’t want to hear. But New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo says bank executives deliberately misled Mayopoulos about the size of Merrill’s losses and that when he tried to confront one of them, he was sacked.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?: U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff in Manhattan plans to decide by Monday whether to approve the SEC’s proposed $150 million settlement with Bank of America to resolve charges over disclosure of the Merrill losses.
