NEW YORK, April 23 (UPI) -- Bank of America Chief Executive Officer Ken Lewis said U.S. officials "instructed" him to keep quiet about the bank's purchase of Merrill Lynch.
Transcripts of testimony given to the New York State attorney general's office in February, reveal that Lewis believed former U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson Jr. and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke had told him to keep the Merrill Lynch negotiations under wraps, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.