John Alexander Thain was born on 26 May 1955, in Antioch, Illinois USA. And is an investment banker and businessman, best known as the former CEO of the CIT Group. He was also the last CEO of Merrill Lynch before its merger with Bank of America. All of his efforts have helped put his net worth to where it is today.
How rich is John Thain? As of mid-2016, sources estimate a net worth that is at $100 million, mostly earned through his numerous investments and business positions. He was set to have a big position at Bank of America, but controversies forced him to resign. As he continues his endeavors it is expected that his wealth will increase.
John Thain Net Worth $100 million
John attended MIT and graduated with a degree in electrical engineering in 1977. He then earned an MBA from Harvard Business School two years later.
Thain became known as part of Goldman Sachs, in which he worked as the head of mortgage securities from 1985, and eventually became president of the company in 1999, holding the position until 2004. In that year he moved to the New York Stock Exchange and became its CEO for the next three years. Afterwards, he came to Merrill as the company’s CEO, with the planned merger of the company with Bank of America potentially amounting to around $50 billion. At this time, Thain was set to be the president of global banking, securities, and wealth management before controversies were discovered.
Thain earned a lot of money from Merrill Lynch including a $15 million signing bonus. He became one of the best paid executives in the business world, and he earned a total of $83.7 million with the company in 2007 alone. It was then uncovered in 2009 that he was spending large amounts of money privately for renovation and furniture, but eventually reimbursed the amount. However, it was then found that he was awarding huge executive payments. In the same year, Bank of America announced that Merrill actually suffered a loss of $15 billion, an amount previously undisclosed by John. This led to Bank of America doubting Thain’s credibility and the tension eventually led to his resignation.
Thain became well known for his controversial spending and even Obama referred to him as part of the group of executives who used taxpayer money for things such as renovation. Obama also criticized the large bonuses he was giving out as it was being given to people who already had money, while other institutions and people suffered.
In 2010, it was reported that CIT signed Thain and paid him a total of $8.25 million. In 2015, the company announced that John would retire as CEO, but continue to serve as Chairman of the Board of Directors. He was replaced by Ellen R. Alemany.
For his personal life, Thain is married to Carmen and they have two children, and live in a 25 acre property in New York spanning three townships. It is known that Thain is very active in terms of social work and charity work. He became the gala co-chair for a Publicolor event honoring Rick Segal. He also contributed more than $200,000 for the “Right to Rise” pro-Jeb Bush presidential campaign.
