What a pompous ass O'Neal has been. To be rewarded for his lack of effort to make good with his company, is despicable.

dlw

I think the Merrill Board should sue O'Neil and retreive some of their losses. Isn't that their responsibility?

I believe Mr. O'Neil should be awarded the Robert Mugabe award for excellence in the work place.

Ithink that some of the board members and or officers should be reevaluated based on their approval of ONeal. They are responible for such a poor choice. Can we trust their future decisions

I believe O'Neil should be sued for all that can be retrieved from his assets and made to pay back every penny his unauthorized activities lost. Maybe when he is earning $6.00 mopping a Burger King's floor he will realize the value of a dollar as do the people who have to suffer because he is careless and thoughless.

All of your comments shows each lack of knowledge each of you have about the situation and the company and how billion dollar companies operate. When he took over Merrills stock was trading at 31 and peaked around 93 and they have a market cap around 58 bil. He had
the biggest fall because he took the biggest risk, which is how money is made in this game. Merrill had Net Profits of 7.5 billion last year, how quickly everyone forgets that a lot of people got rich
under Stan, so why shouldn't he. With over 21 years of service and taking Merrill to new heights he deserves every penny he gets, he has
made Merrill a 1000 times more than the 160mil he is walking away with. He is not the first CEO to misstep and he won't be the last. He had 11 bosses to answer to, he did not and could not have made asingle move with out the boards approval! Who do the have to answer
to?

Lisa--I take exception to your comments above. Obviously you did not study finance 101. I would not want you to be the CEO of any company that I am a shareholder in. You would probably make the same mistakes that Mr. O'Neal made leading to his prompt and rightful dismissal.

Firstly, Mr. O'Neal was fired by Merrill's Board of Directors for cause, notwithstanding that he was allowed to treat it as a retirement. He screwed up royally and used very bad judgment in his job. He was known for being very arrogant and was not usually interested in the views of his close colleagues. In essence, he became a gambler with Merrill Lynch's assets and highly leveraged them in the subprime mortgage business. Do you know of any other employees who could be fired for cause and be rewarded so handsomely as Mr. O'Neal? Do you think that you employer (assuming that you have one) would reward you so handsomely if you failed terribly in the performance of your job? I don't think so!

According to you, it is ok to write off $8.4 billion dollars in 2007 because of the subprime mess at Merrill, which is more than the $7.5 earned in 2006. There is no assurance at this juncture that the eventual writeoffs relating to the subprime debacle at Merrill will not exceed $8.4 billion dollars. Mr. O'Neal had a fiduciary responsibility to his board of directors and most importantly to the Merrill shareholders. He certainly is entitled to an "F" grade for such performance.

The stock has plunged from a high of $98.68 in 2006 to a closing price of $55.88 on November 5, 2007. The shareholders have not been rewarded--why should Mr. O'Neal be rewarded? You don't normally reward an employee with over 21 years of service when you fire him for cause along the way. What value did he add when the stock has dropped over 43% from its high. Contrary to your beliefs, money is not made in corporate America by taking the biggest risks. The size of the risks taken by Mr. O'Neal were unwarranted, but in line with his enormous ego.

Obviously the Board of Directors would not agree with your comments; otherwise they would not have summarily fired him. He is only being rewarded so handsomely because top executives have iron clad employment agreements which provide "golden parachutes" and other financial beneifts that the average employee could not possibly ever get. Corporate executives need accountibility and should be penalized financially when they screw up like Mr. O'Neal did. Unfortunately, the corporate world does not yet work that way.

I am sure that class action law suits will be filed by Merrill shareholders in hopes of recovering some of their stock losses because of Mr. O'Neal reckless regard for Merrill's shareholders. Lastly, those that got rich under Mr. O'Neal's reign were those who were fortunate enough to sell their Merrill stock when it was in the $90 range. I now have a loss in my Merrill stock and am furious that someone like Mr. O'Neal could almost wreck a prestigious firm like Merrill with his reckless management style. How such a supposedly brilliant man could be so absolutely stupid in the end analysis is beyond me. The answer is oversized ego and greed.

Yes, Mr. O'Neal did take Merrill to "new heights" which is meaningless because so much of it was quickly wiped away. He was well on his way to taking Merrill to "new lows" when he was fired.

Amen.

This shithead (O'Neal) spent more time on diversity bullshit hires than minding the store...as a retired 38 year employee I am disgusted how this has evolved...The board would be wise to hire someone who understands the industry instead of a reject from the auto industry (Oneal)

Last summer I made a trade error of $17,000 in a client account at ML. (Hong Kong Stock, thus 24 hour delay in covering). I immediately went to management and took responsability. Policy meant my NET pay was docked for two months to reimburse the firm. Why wasn't Stan's comp docked for his error?

Ok, Merrill under O'Neal underperformed Goldman and Lehman, but it outperformed Citi, JP Morgan, and Morgan Stanley. As for his exit package, it's obscene but you have to give the dude marks for being a sly negotiator. Investment banking stocks are very risky so you don't buy them and then start bitching when you get burnt. Why didn't you buy Procter & Gamble instead?

As an employee this guy turned a jewel into a piece of coal. Between the co- presidents(whatever happened to 1 President), to the constant diversity platform constantly being forced in our face, to the grandson of a slave routine...give it a rest already. This is what affirmative action does. Question: when O'neal released the initial pre-announcement of approx. 3B writedown to the ultimate final 7.5B writedown, during that time, Did you sleep well ....Stan?!? Where is the accountability for poor due diligence? Oh, I forgot.....lets just "move on". Shhhhhh.....keep it quiet.

The "Board" must be looked at. Dont assume just because they are there they have a clue about management.