Morgan Stanley Subject of Takeover Rumors

With all the turmoil at Morgan Stanley, New York, coming to a head in the past week, Wall St. has been rife with speculation regarding the company as a takeover candidate.Among those firms that are speculated to be interested in Morgan Stanley is Charlotte, N.C.-based Bank of America. The question is whether BofA would be interested in all or part of Morgan Stanley. A report from Merrill Lynch states it is unlikely BofA will bid for all of Morgan Stanley. "In our recent meeting with management, BofA's chief executive, Ken Lewis, stated, 'We can be the top fixed income player in the U.S. by 2009 without a major acquisition. That is our goal.' He also said, 'I am 99.9% sure you will not see us buy a (major) investment bank.' Rather, we think BofA would be more interested in acquiring certain pieces of Morgan Stanley, if available, including 1) its Investment Management and Individual Investor Groups (IM & IIG) and 2) its Credit Services division (i.e. Discover)," said Merrill Lynch analyst Edward R. Najarian, The report notes that BofA's fixed income capital markets unit already does a large share of mortgage-backed securities business. However on the consumer side, Morgan Stanley does originate residential and commercial mortgage loans.

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