Bank of America CEO gets his prey

By Jonathan Stempel

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Kenneth Lewis's seven-year tenure at the helm of Bank of America has been marked by big, audacious, complicated acquisitions.

Buying Merrill Lynch may top them all.

Lewis's plan to buy Merrill in a $50 billion (27.7 billion pounds) all-stock transaction cements his reputation as one of the most aggressive acquirers in corporate history, with well over $150 billion of acquisitions.

In that sense, the 61-year-old Lewis proved a worthy successor to Hugh McColl, who was known as 'Huge' for his deal making. That included the $43.1 billion purchase in 1998 of BankAmerica by his NationsBank, which created Bank of America.

"The Merrill acquisition meets three of Ken Lewis' key requirements for acquisitions: brand, scale, and best in class franchise," wrote Oppenheimer analyst Meredith Whitney.

Assuming no problems with antitrust regulators, the addition of Merrill would turn Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America into a behemoth.

Bank of America was already by far the biggest U.S. retail bank, with more than 6,100 branches and about one in every 10 U.S. dollars on deposit. It was also the largest credit card issuer and home equity loan provider.

The bank said adding Merrill would make it the largest U.S. brokerage, with more than 20,000 financial advisers and $2.5 trillion of client assets.