Merge

It was the first thing analysts asked Black & Decker boss Nolan D. Archibald about the Maryland company's sale to The Stanley Works. "Why now?" James C. Lucas of Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia queried during a Tuesday conference call. "What drove this transaction today as opposed to any time in years past?" Archibald had an answer, which I'll get to. But the real answers seem obvious. After one of the longest reigns in history for a Fortune 500 CEO, Archibald is old enough to retire and ready to relinquish power.

Black & Decker Corp., the Towson-based toolmaker founded here almost 100 years ago, said Monday that it plans to merge with The Stanley Works in a $4.5 billion all-stock deal that will bring together internationally known brands but reduce the number of local jobs. For the Baltimore region, it is another in a long line of deals relocating corporate headquarters - and the decision-making power, charitable muscle and prestige they represent. Stanley would have controlling interest in the combined company, which would be named Stanley Black & Decker and headquartered in New Britain, Conn.

Baltimore-based Bradford Bank, which had been placed under federal supervision in February, must merge with or be acquired by another financial institution or sell itself by Aug. 24, according to a federal regulatory document. The Office of Thrift Supervision, in an order dated July 24, issued a "prompt corrective action directive" against the bank, requiring it to complete a merger, acquisition or sale of its assets and liabilities to another financial institution within 30 days. The OTS had issued a "cease and desist" order against the bank in February, when regulators said Bradford pursued "an aggressive growth strategy that was poorly planned and executed, unsupported by adequate and appropriate levels of capital."

The movers are taking Baltimore Hebrew University apart, clearing faculty offices, piling high the boxes and unplugged computers, rolling up the lobby's Oriental carpet and marking leather chairs with stickers identifying their next stop: "TU." That's Towson University, now officially the new home of BHU's graduate courses and community programs. The Maryland Board of Regents voted unanimously Friday to approve the new partnership, closing one chapter in the life of the 90-year-old institution of Jewish learning and opening another.

The livelihood that Rick Shaub has known his entire life changed in minutes Thursday when he got the call that the Germantown car dealership his family has owned since the end of World War I was one of hundreds to be closed by financially troubled Chrysler LLC in the coming month. Shaub, who has $2.5 million worth of cars on the lot at Montrose Dodge that Chrysler won't buy back, said he will probably have to file for bankruptcy-law protection, too. Chrysler said Thursday it was closing 789 of its 3,200 dealerships as it works to restructure in bankruptcy-law protection and merge with Italy's Fiat Group SpA. In Maryland, 15 dealerships would be affected by the closures.

Baltimore schools chief Andres Alonso unveiled last night a huge reorganization plan to close failing schools and expand successful ones, at the same time as he proposed 179 central office job cuts to close a budget shortfall. The plan, which would affect about three dozen schools and thousands of students, puts aside the reform strategy of downsizing schools that Baltimore and many other cities have embraced in recent years. Instead, it emphasizes student and parent choice: Low-performing schools that no one wants to attend would shut or merge with higher-performing, more popular ones.

Oxford, Ohio - Detroit is feeling the urge to merge. The Big Three automakers are burning through billions in cash. Stock values for General Motors and Ford are plummeting. So, in desperation, GM engaged in merger discussions with Ford this year, and reportedly is now entertaining the prospect of merging with Chrysler. Such a merger, though, is an awful idea. First, the record of corporate acquisitions involving the Big Three has been disastrous over the past decade: GM spent $2.4 billion on an option to acquire Fiat in 2000, only to spend another $2 billion to escape the deal five years later.

After a New York company acquired Alex. Brown Inc. in 1997, divisions of the venerable Baltimore investment firm - which helped finance companies ranging from the B&O Railroad to Starbucks - began to go their separate ways. And for almost that long, ever since his Brown Advisory division went independent in 1998, Chief Executive Michael D. Hankin has dreamed of bringing some of the brain trust back together. Yesterday, he announced an official reunion: Alex.Brown Investment Management's 25 employees will move from their downtown offices this fall to Fells Point, where they will merge with Hankin's team of about 170 people.

Gorfine, Schiller & Gardyn PA, an Owings Mills certified public accounting firm, merged yesterday with the accounting division of Smart and Associates in Towson, the firm formerly known as Grabush, Newman & Co. PA. Gorfine, Schiller & Gardyn gained about 20 people in the transaction, expanding it to more than 75 employees. It will retain its name and location at the corporate campus in Owings Mills. No employees will be laid off, said W. James Schiller, a founding partner.

Vertis Communications Inc. said yesterday that it would merge with one of its largest competitors in the second attempt to combine the two debt-laden companies amid declines in the advertising and printing industries. The Baltimore company's plans last year to buy Brentwood, Tenn.-based American Color Graphics failed, but it said the two firms will now merge through a so-called prepackaged bankruptcy proceeding, which would reduce their combined debt by nearly $1 billion. The two companies said the deal would give them a larger and more competitive foothold in the industry.