Panel asks BofA executives to testify

Nov 06, 2009 (The Charlotte Observer - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- BAC | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- A key U.S. House panel is asking Bank of America Corp. to make consumer banking head Brian Moynihan available to testify on Nov. 17 as part of its ongoing probe of the bank's Merrill Lynch & Co. acquisition, a source familiar with the situation said.

The Oversight and Government Reform Committee also is asking former general counsel Tim Mayopoulos and directors Chad Gifford and Thomas May to appear, the source said. The committee is probing whether the government forced the bank to complete its Merrill deal last December or whether the bank threatened to back out to win more government aid.

The committee's staff is also seeking to interview Moynihan on Nov. 11, the source said. He briefly replaced Mayopoulos as general counsel and was involved in the bank's effort to back out of the deal.

A spokeswoman for the committee's chairman, Democrat Edolphus Towns of New York, declined to comment.

Moynihan is one of the top internal candidates being considered as a replacement for Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis, who has announced plans to step down at year's end. At an event in California on Thursday, he expressed interest in the job in an interview with Reuters.

"Anybody would want this job. It's one of the best jobs in the business," Moynihan told Reuters. "This is a great company and I will continue to do a great job for it, no matter what the outcome."

Bank of America has also approached outside candidates, but a number of big names have declined the company's advances. One of them, Bank of New York Mellon Corp. CEO Bob Kelly, sent a memo to his top lieutenants on Wednesday reiterating he doesn't want the job.

"I want to be clear: I am not interested," Kelly wrote in the memo, which was obtained by the Observer.

Another possibility getting some buzz on Thursday was New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine, a former Goldman Sachs CEO who lost his re-election bid this week. A Corzine spokesperson could not be reached.

The search is being led by a committee comprising six Bank of America board members. Three of the committee members, including Gifford and May, joined in the 2004 FleetBoston Financial Corp. merger. They are believed to be close to Moynihan, a former Fleet executive who remains based in Boston. Moynihan told Reuters the directors are "working expeditiously," without elaborating.

A source familiar with the situation told the Observer on Thursday that some board members are concerned that the search process won't be perceived well by investors. Some investors have questioned how hard the bank is looking for outside candidates.

Two candidates with Charlotte connections, former Bank of America Chief Financial Officers Jim Hance and Al de Molina, are increasingly seen as not in the running to get the job, sources said. De Molina, the CEO of struggling auto lender GMAC Financial Services, has recently told colleagues he is committed to seeing GMAC through to better times.

Bank of America spokesman Scott Silvestri declined to comment.

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