Legal News

Biggest pension funds in U.S. want to lead suits against BofA

By Richard Binder

The California Public Employees? Retirement System, or CalPERS, and the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS) asked to lead investor lawsuits over the acquisition of Merrill Lynch & Co. by Bank of America Corp.

Investors in the group lawsuits allege Bank of America management misled investors about Merrill Lynch?s financial condition as shareholders voted on the merger. The California pension funds lost $264 million because of allegedly false and misleading statements by Bank of America, according to yesterday?s filing.

"Shareowners did not have complete or accurate information prior to approving the merger, and the failure of Bank of America to provide it sent the stock price down dramatically," CalPERS Board President Rob Feckner said in a statement . "Compounding the harm to shareowners was the fact that bonuses were paid to Merrill executives early and were not disclosed to shareowners prior to the merger."

The CalPERS/CalSTRS filing comes on the heels of Jerry Finger's campaign to unseat BofA's chairman of the board as well as two other board members.

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Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on March 24, 2009 (boomark / email).