Alan ‘Ace’ Greenberg, Dead at 86, Never Lost Faith in Big Banks
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Alan C. “Ace” Greenberg, who transformed Bear Stearns Cos. from a small bond shop into the fifth-largest U.S. securities firm, never lost his faith in the bigness of banks.
Greenberg, who died yesterday at 86, said in a 2010 book that the bank run that swallowed Bear Stearns in 2008 stemmed from “a groundless rumor” that it had a liquidity problem. He blamed his successor, James “Jimmy” Cayne, for becoming “more aloof and full of himself” as the firm’s share price rose in 2007, which “couldn’t help but impair certain business judgments.”