Former Merrill prez wins $1.2M award — but still loses

The good news for Ahmass Fakahany, a former top executive of Merrill Lynch & Co.: On March 24, a Finra panel awarded him $1.2 million in an arbitration claim against his former firm. The bad news? He was seeking $70 million. Mr. Fakahany, formerly CFO of Merrill and later co-president, helped oversee risk management at the company as losses began to mount on subprime mortgages and bonds in 2007. He resigned from Merrill in January 2008 when John Thain came in to take over the troubled firm. Ultimately, the Wall Street firm suffered from huge write-offs related to mortgage-backed bonds. Mr. Fakahany filed his arbitration claim against Merrill in December 2008, pressing his former employer to pay him for work and make good on promises. In an interview with Bloomberg, John Orsini, an attorney representing Mr. Fakahany, disputed the $70 million figure that arbitrators listed on the order. In an interview, he claimed the Finra panel's decision was “totally incorrect.” He did not elaborate or comment on the ruling. "This was a compensation dispute that pre-dated Bank of America's acquisition of Merrill Lynch," said William Halldin, a Bank of America spokesman, in a statement. The arbitration award provided no details of the events that led Mr. Fakahany to file the claim. (Bloomberg News contributed reporting to this article)