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Bear Stearns

The Bear Stearns Companies, Inc. (former New York Stock Exchange ticker symbol BSC) based in New York City, was one of the largest global investment banks and securities trading and brokerage firms prior to its sudden collapse and distress sale to JPMorgan Chase in March 2008. The main business areas, based on 2006 net revenue distributions, were: capital markets (equities, fixed income, investment banking; just under 80%), wealth management (under 10%) and global clearing services (12%).

Bear Stearns pioneered the securitization and asset-backed securities markets, and as investor losses mounted in those markets in 2006 and 2007, the company actually increased its exposure, especially the mortgage-backed assets that were central to the subprime mortgage crisis. In March 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York provided an emergency loan to try to avert a sudden collapse of the company. The company could not be saved, however, and was sold to JPMorgan Chase for as low as ten dollars per share, a price far below the 52-week high of $133.20 per share, traded before the crisis, although not as low as the two dollars per share originally agreed upon by Bear Stearns and JP Morgan Chase.[1]

The collapse of the company was a key prelude event to the risk management meltdown of the Wall Street investment bank industry in September 2008, and the subsequent global financial crisis and recession.

Overview

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Stearns was founded as an equity trading house on May Day 1923 by Joseph Bear, Robert Stearns, and Harold Mayer with $500,000 in capital.[2]. Internal tensions quickly arose between the three founders. The firm survived the Wall Street Crash of 1929 without laying off any employees and by 1933 opened its first branch office in Chicago.[2] In 1933, with the hope of starting a corporate bond business, one of the firm's new partners, Teddy Low recommended that they hire Salim L. Lewis, a twenty-four year old to run it.[3] By 1949, Salim, widely known by his nickname Cy had become the managing partner and prominent figure of the firm.[3] In 1955, the firm opened its first international office in Amsterdam.[2] In 1985, Bear Stearns became a publicly traded company.[2] It served corporations, institutions, governments and individuals. The company's business included corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, institutional equities, fixed income sales & risk management, trading and research, private client services, derivatives, foreign exchange and futures sales and trading, asset management and custody services. Through Bear Stearns Securities Corp., it offered global clearing services to broker dealers, prime broker clients, and other professional traders, including securities lending.[4] Bear Stearns was also known for one of the most widely read market intelligence pieces on the street, known as the "Early Look at the Market - Bear Stearns Morning View".

Bear Stearns' World Headquarters was located at 383 Madison Avenue, between East 46th Street and East 47th Street in Manhattan. The company employed more than 15,500 people worldwide. The firm was headquartered in New York City with offices in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, Irvine, San Francisco, San Juan, Whippany, New Jersey, and St. Louis. Internationally the firm had offices in London, Beijing, Dublin, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, Lugano, Milan, São Paulo, Mumbai, Shanghai, Singapore, and Tokyo.

In 2005-2007, Bear Stearns was recognized as the "Most Admired" securities firm in Fortune’s "America's Most Admired Companies" survey, and second overall in the security firm section. The annual survey is a prestigious ranking of employee talent, quality of risk management and business innovation. This was the second time in three years that Bear Stearns had achieved this "top" distinction.

On March 17, 2008, JP Morgan Chase offered to acquire Bear Stearns at a price of $236 million, or $2 per share. On March 24, 2008, that offer was raised to $1.1 billion or $10 per share in an effort to pacify angry shareholders. JPMorgan Chase completed its acquisition of Bear Stearns on May 30, 2008 at the renegotiated price of $10 per share.

Financials
As of November 30, 2006, the company had total capital of approximately $66.7 billion and total assets of $350.4 billion. According to the April 2005 issue of Institutional Investor magazine, Bear Stearns was the seventh-largest securities firm in terms of total capital.

As of November 30, 2007 Bear Stearns had notional contract amounts of approximately $13.40 trillion in derivative financial instruments, of which $1.85 trillion were listed futures and option contracts. In addition, Bear Stearns was carrying more than $28 billion in 'level 3' assets on its books at the end of fiscal 2007 versus a net equity position of only $11.1 billion. This $11.1 billion supported $395 billion in assets,[5] which means a leverage ratio of 35.5 to 1. This highly leveraged balance sheet, consisting of many illiquid and potentially worthless assets, led to the rapid diminution of investor and lender confidence, which finally evaporated as Bear was forced to call the New York Federal Reserve to stave off the looming cascade of counterparty risk which would ensue from forced liquidation.

Subprime mortgage hedge fund crisis
Main article: 2007 subprime mortgage financial crisis
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