Spotlight: John Thain

last updated 8 January 2015

John Thain isn’t exactly a “people person,” said Dominic Rushe in the London Sunday Times. “Stiff, cerebral, and intimidating,” Thain, 52, was known to his colleagues at the NYSE, where he was CEO, as “I, Robot.” But Thain’s “record for turning around troubled institutions has made him the hottest property on Wall Street,” and last week, Merrill Lynch tapped him as its new CEO. “Thain’s appointment signals wider changes on Wall Street.” A Goldman Sachs alumnus with a background in operations and information technology, Thain “is a technician as much as a leader.” He took the top spot at the NYSE in 2003 after Richard Grasso’s “messy departure,” which was prompted by outrage over his $140 million pay package. Under Thain, the exchange became a public corporation and merged with Euronext, which runs several European stock exchanges. Brokers at Merrill are bracing for massive layoffs, noting that Thain showed his “ruthless streak” at both the NYSE and Goldman, where he engineered the ouster of former CEO Jon Corzine, now the governor of New Jersey.