Ken Lewis judgement wrongly being called into question
Late last year, the American Banker of the Year awards were held, and the winner was Ken Lewis . Fast forward and his decisions on Merrill Lynch, China Construction Bank and Countrywide are being put together a call for his resignation. In particular the article notes somewhat to my surprise that BofA were not pressed into taking over Merrill – this was done voluntarily.
In any event the armchair quarterbacks are out in force. The strategic opportunities of China, Mortgages, and brokerages were 100% accepted as valid at the time by commentators, newspapers, government and industry. The problems that arose in 2007 were universal, and systemic of a broken banking and brokerage model – a systemic problem in the interdependencies of members of the world financial system that was not understood.
More important to my mind will be how Lewis deals with the current crisis.
It wasn’t the choice of recipient that was wrong… it was giving out the award in the first place.
Ron Shevlin
January 19, 2009 at 15:18
@ron … well that too … quite right.
Colin
January 19, 2009 at 22:19