Bank of America: Personal Banking, Home Equity Loans, Refinance, Auto Loans

Bank of America

www.bankofamerica.com
NYSE: BAC
(Finance: Banking Services)

What is now Bank of America Corporation, headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, was first founded in 1904 as the Bank of Italy. Currently Bank of America provides services to more than 150 countries. In 2008, Bank of America acquired wealth management company Merrill Lynch.

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Services
Banking, Home Equity Loans, Refinance Loans, Mortgages, Investing, Auto Loans, Insurance, IRAs, Credit Cards

Overview
Bank of America offers an array of personal banking, small business banking, and corporate banking services. Consumers are offered checking, savings and CDs, credit cards, IRAs, insurance and protection, home equity loans, mortgage loans, refinancing loans, and auto loans. In addition to these products and services, B of A helps their customers to manage money and funds by offering online banking, online investing, online bill payments, expenses tracking, and mobile banking to name a few.

In effort to help customers in achieving their financial goals, B of A offers investment services through recently acquired Merrill Lynch, retirement planning, and a variety of programs, such as their Keep the Change®, Privacy Assist®, and Add It Up™ Cash Back. B of A even serves military personnel by offering products and services designed specifically for those who serve, or have served, in military services.

Bank of America has many student related programs to help pay for school and education expenses. Their website also offers several tools and learning resources designed to make customers better informed consumers when it comes to making financial decisions. As a world leader in banking services, B of A provides all banking and investment services, utilizing partnerships with industry leaders.

Bank of America has often been referred to as the machine. As one of the largest banks in the US, along with JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup, Bank of America has nearly 6,000 branch locations in 40 states. The primary services offered through the bank include consumer banking, small business banking, asset management, and credit card services. In 2009, Bank of America acquired a crippled Merrill Lynch, due to the global credit crisis, for $50 billion in stock. This acquisition greatly increased Bank of America’s investment banking, wealth management, and international business portfolio.

As one of the world’s leading wealth management institutions, Bank of America boasts $1.8 trillion in assets under their care. The bank also obtained a 49 percent stake in BlackRock, a large player in the asset management field, however it was later diluted to 34 percent when BlackRock acquired Barclays Global Investors in 2009.

The Merrill Lynch acquisition permitted the failed investment bank to issue early bonuses worth billions to executive, which promptly caused Bank of America shareholders to speak out in anger. Shortly thereafter, the Securities and Exchange Commission fined Bank of America for $33 million, claiming shareholders were misled about the bonuses. In 2009, a federal judge rejected the fine and the matter was ordered to go to trial. Bank of American agreed to settle out of court for $150 million.

Bank of American CEO at the time, Ken Lewis, said that certain truths were not disclosed to investors due to pressure he received from the federal government to keep the Merrill Lynch deal from falling apart. In 2009, an effort was made to provide more accountability to the public when the chairman and CEO positions were split. Director Walter Massey was named chairman and Lew stepped down. The head of consumer banking and small business affairs, Brian Moynihan, succeeded Lewis as CEO. In 2010, Charles Holliday, the longtime Dupont CEO, replaced a retiring Massey as chairman.

In the past year, Bank of America has worked to implement a restructuring plan that is a combination of reducing its branch network by 10 percent and its total workforce by 10 percent, approximately 30,000 employees.

In effort to shore up capital levels, Bank of America has sold assets and securities, including the sale of First Republic, a private bank acquired in the Merrill Lynch transaction, General Atlantic, and Colony Capital four roughly $1 million. Bank of America also sold Columbia Management to Ameriprise for $1.2 billion and reduced its stake in China Construction Bank to 10 percent.

Another monumental acquisition by Bank of America was when they purchased Countrywide Financial in 2008. The deal instantly made Bank of America the largest residential mortgage lender and services in the country. Bank of America settled a lawsuit that claimed Countrywide engaged in deceptive lending activities, and in effort to avoid the stigma, renamed the mortgage lender to Bank of America Home Loans in 2009.

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