Bank Of America

Wachovia customers will become part of the nation's largest bank under a $2.16 billion deal announced yesterday in which Citigroup Inc. will acquire Wachovia's banking operations. Customers of Wachovia, which is the Baltimore area's third-largest bank with about 9 percent of the market in terms of deposits, shouldn't expect changes until the end of the year, when the deal is expected to close. Even then, terms on outstanding loans, certificates of deposit and mortgages will remain the same.

NEW YORK - A day after Lehman Brothers sought to assure Wall Street that it could survive on its own, the beleaguered investment bank, urged on by federal officials, bowed to mounting pressure yesterday and put itself up for sale. As confidence in Lehman continued to drain away yesterday, the bank, one of the oldest names on Wall Street, reached out to several potential acquirers, including Bank of America and Barclays, the big British bank, according to people briefed on the negotiations.

Countrywide Financial Corp. is offering two years of free credit monitoring to customers whose sensitive personal information, including Social Security numbers, allegedly was stolen from the home lender's computers. In one of the largest data-theft cases in years, a former Countrywide employee was arrested Aug. 1 and charged with illegally accessing the company's computers for more than two years. He has pleaded not guilty. The information was being sold to mortgage brokers to be used as sales leads, federal authorities said in August.

On Saturday, August 9, 2008, JOHN WESLEY HENSON, JR., of Springfield, VA., beloved husband of Dorothy "Dottie" devoted father of Ashley and Dana, son of John, Sr., brother of Arnold and Terri. Viewing Friday, August 15, 11 A.M. until service 12 noon at Greater Little Zion Baptist Church, 10185 Zion Drive, Fairfax, VA. Interment private. In lieu of flowers, contributions to the daughters college fund at Bank of America. Services Thornton Funeral Home, P.A.

A Pennsylvania man pleaded guilty yesterday to taking nearly $400,000 from a Howard County bank in December by posing as an armored-car driver who was picking up deposits. Robert Allen Flanagan, 38, of Dallastown, Pa., is also accused of trying the same scheme at several businesses one day in October in Baltimore and Howard counties. He was successful only once, taking deposits of $70,000 from a Target store in Towson. He was arrested and charged with three counts of attempted theft of $500 or more and one count of theft of $500 or more in Baltimore County, according to court and police records, and posted a $50,000 bond.

When Brenda Fishkin got the letter from Bank of America late last month, she thought it might be a joke. The bank said it planned to almost double the interest rate on her credit card, from about 13 percent to 24.99 percent. Fishkin, who is 60, could not figure out what she had done to incur the higher rate. She had never been late on a credit card payment, just refinanced her home at a lower interest rate and just been rewarded by her credit union with a lower rate on her credit card there, she said.

Countrywide Financial Corp. founder Angelo R. Mozilo, one of the nation's highest-paid chief executives, stands to reap $115 million in severance-related pay if his troubled company is acquired by Bank of America, regulatory filings show. Free rides on the company jet also are included in Mozilo's departure deal, and the company would pick up his country club bills until 2011. Other executives, including Home Depot's jettisoned chief executive Robert L. Nardelli, have garnered bigger packages.

Countrywide Financial, the troubled lender that became a symbol of the excesses that led to the subprime mortgage crisis, is negotiating a sale to Bank of America, according to people briefed on the matter, a move that would rescue it from an increasingly uncertain future. As the nation's largest mortgage lender, Countrywide helped fuel the housing boom by offering loans to high-risk borrowers. But as home prices began dropping last year and borrower defaults soared, Countrywide's lending practices came under the spotlight of legislators, regulators and consumer advocates.

Four Prince George's County men suspected of cashing forged checks worth more than $18,000 in a four-hour period at Bank of America branches were arrested in Hanover, Anne Arundel County police said yesterday. After the first four checks were cashed Saturday, Bank of America flagged the account being used. Later, police were called when someone tried to cash a check for $4,500 that afternoon at the Bank of America branch at Arundel Mills mall, police said. Officers were called to the bank, and the suspect gave a description of a car he and his associates were using.

WASHINGTON -- Big-name investment banks are taking a financial beating this year, leaving many Americans to ask: Just how did all these Wall Street bankers in their $5,000 John Lobb shoes manage to step in you-know-what? The answer is simple: They made the same mistakes as the rest of us, just with more zeros attached to them and bigger consequences for the U.S. economy, if not for their own $625 John Lobb wallets. Those mistakes are why the heads of Merrill Lynch & Co. and Citigroup Inc. have been ousted in recent weeks, why household names such as Bank of America Corp.