Danny Schechter - ColdType

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was financing and forcing the bank sale to JPM to the tune of
$30bn but only paying BS investors $2 a share.
Saturday, March 15: BEAR SHARE PRICE: $25
BAMBER: We learned that it was a price dictated by the
Treasury Department.
DS: The employees who owned 30% of those shares were
furious. Many believed that Bear was turned into a sacrificial
lamb. They and their investors were wiped out.
Your book suggests that the Fed could have easily loaned
money to Bear to get through the crisis.
BAMBER: Minutes after Bear made the deal with JPM,
they opened up the discount window for the very first time.
Had Bear had access to that window, we’d have survived as
an independent entity, we’d have had time to negotiate a deal,
good for Bear, good for the shareholders, BS employees, etc
with a large financial institution.
Bear employees did get their share price up to $10 a share
in exchange for refusing to approve the deal. Many shareholders
were wiped out. Most of the government’s money paid off
Bear’s creditors.
SUNDAY, MARCH 16: BEAR SHARE PRICE: $2 (Later negotiated
to $10 a share.)
Deal was done. Bear Stearns was integrated into JPMorgan
Chase. Bear Stearns CEO James Cayne (A, not O) would
later called this forced “merger” a “conspiracy” and expressed
hopes that the government would get the people who did it.
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In the week before Bear Stearns collapsed, parties unknown
bought so-called put options to drive down the company’s