These guys all across the country are basically being told they are being turned into branch offices of Bank of America.
- Quoth an anonymous insider on Merrill’s thundering herd. It comes via Clusterstock, which on Wednesday ran this seemingly well-sourced and pretty impressive scoop on a big shakeup underway at Bank of America/Merrill. Specifically, that:
The head of the legendary 16,000 person brokerage unit –often referred to as “the thundering herd”–is being ousted in favor of a Bank of America insider… and…
Changes in the way brokers are compensated will likely make pay less transparent and less reliable.
Merrill, either way, are being very funny in dealing with the story. First, the bank on Wednesday sent round an internal email to all staff at lunchtime warning that a “fictitious” story was circulating about ML. And then, later, a BofA spokesperson, Selena Morris, then went on to totally deny the story publicly to The Street’s Dan Freed.
It’s completely without merit.
All of which was done in spite of ML refusing Clusterstock’s efforts to officially seek comment on their story. Merrill Lynch still has not formally denied the story to Clusterstock.
Over, then, to Clusterstock:
We stand by our story, and we are confident in the accuracy of our reporting and our sources. As we noted in our original story, the planned management shakeup and changes to compensation could be undone by “last minute maneuvers.” One possibility is that the firm will scramble to cover for itself after seeing the reaction to our publication of the management and compensation plans. If anything, we’re hearing that the turmoil at the firm is only increasing, with big time financial advisers contemplating leaving.