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Biggest Baller At World’s Top Financial Forced Out
October 31st, 2007Stan O’Neal was the first African American to head a major Wall Street company
Stan O’Neal, who on Tuesday stepped down as CEO of the w
orld’s largest financial brokerage firm, the latest victim to be crushed under the nation’s swelling credit crisis, will walk away with benefits and stock awards worth more than $160 million. O’Neal, who watched Merrill Lynch’s quarterly earnings crash to the tune of $2.24 billion, became the first African American to head a major Wall Street firm when he took over five years ago. Problems at Merrill Lynch, founded 93 years ago, can be attributed largely to subprime mortgages and other risky types of debt. About a month ago, Merrill Lynch warned investors it would report a loss after reducing the overestimated value of assets by some $4.5 billion; it blamed the plummeting value on bonds backed by mortgages made to people with shaky credit. Three weeks later, O’Neal rocked Wall Street when he acknowledged that the loss was really about $8 billion. That didn’t endear him to investors who immediately pressed for his ouster. A 56-year-old grandson of slaves, O’Neal, an Alabama native, gained a reputation as wheeler-dealer investor who didn’t mind taking risks. “Mr. O’Neal and the board of directors both agreed that a change in leadership would best enable Merrill Lynch to move forward and focus on maintaining the strong operating performance of its businesses, which the company last week reported were performing well, apart from sub-prime mortgages and CDOs,” Merrill Lynch said in a statement.
Wow what a story. They took a chance on him and it worked for a little while. But it still quite an achievement. And he still walked away a very wealthy man.
From Alabama to the Board room we embrace you. It’s probally time for Mr. O’neal to move on . Embrace the young black men of our community teach them the merits of your journey.
We need more black men like this.
I’m actually surprised that there haven’t been the typical ‘blame the white man/it’s not his fault’ comment yet. It’s usually the Black community’s MO in terms of these types of issues.
He should be a youth conselor
I’m proud of this brother and I hope he continues to lead other younger Black men to excel. I am glad that there is no blaming some one else.
GOOD! He is a very wealthy man, he did his job and so…
As long as he wasn’t into any scandals, I tip my hat to the brotha. Go enjoy life and give back to the community.
God bless!
Thats business…what can you say? He stepped down but not empty handed…it would be interesting to see what his next business venture will be.
I agree with DL–he should share his experiences with the black youth. it would be good for young kids to see that you can make millions without pimpin females or selling drugs.
Buckeye–If you are not Black, then you may find it difficult to understand the opinions and views of black people. Sometimes we blame “whitey” for certain problems within our community but that is b/c we have a history of being oppressed in this country. Some problems we experience in our community are a direct result of “whitey” but some are not. This is a public forum and what you read here is just a sample of how we feel about certain issues. It is a small representation of our community. Read, analyze, debate anything you read here…but do it with class. Thanks.
Stanley, you did the best you could being a CEO in the fortune 500, it is a tough job even Jack Welch, would admit.
You certainly opened the door for us. Shame, that $9Bn, was lost but then again you liked taking risks, the board supported you when you did, so the decision was not your alone.
Well at least you will have an office open for you for three years, a secretary and a cool $161Million plus other benefits.
I do however feel bad for the investors and people that trusted you with their money. The rest of the board should go as well.
Atl Guy: i am not black, i am asian. i, as a minority in the US, experience enough to know that it is difficult to excel in ANY nation as a minority class. I will not say that i know exactly how difficult it has been for blacks throughout our history.
i had to work extra hard to get where i am today. affirmative action actually makes it harder for us, even though we are a minority!! it was created to allow more unrepresented races (underrepresented in coll/grad schools) to be accepted. Being asian hurts because there are already many asians in grad school.
so that is one blatant barrier that affects the lives of many in the asian community…unfairly at that.
anyway, i wasn’t trying to be harse/classless in my previous comment. i’m just sick of the automatic jump to the assumption that someone else is at fault, when (objectively) it was the man in question. This man (O’Neal), was a major factor in their investors losing BILLIONS OF $$. Come on!!!