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Article: JPMorgan Chase buys out Bear Stearns at $2 a share
- Article from:
- Charleston Gazette
- Article date:
- March 17, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2008 Charleston Gazette. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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NEW YORK - Just four days after Bear Stearns Chief Executive Alan
Schwartz assured Wall Street his company was not in trouble, he was
forced on Sunday to sell the investment bank to competitor JPMorgan
Chase for a bargain-basement price of $2 a share, or $236.2 million.
The stunning last-minute buyout was aimed at averting a Bear
Stearns bankruptcy and a spreading crisis of confidence in the
global financial system sparked by the collapse in the subprime
mortgage market. Bear Stearns was the most exposed to risky bets on
the loans; it is now the first major bank to be undone by that
market's collapse.
The Federal Reserve and the U.S. government swiftly approved the
all-stock buyout, showing ...