Merrill Lynch, the world's largest brokerage, lost nearly US$10 billion in the fourth quarter, its biggest quarterly loss since it was founded 94 years ago, after reporting US$14.6 billion write-downs.
Merrill is the third in suffer a loss for the quarter after taking massive write-offs related to securities backed by souring mortgages.
Citigroup, which showed that it had also lost almost US$10 billion for the fourth quarter, the largest lose in the 196-year history.
Merrill has secured almost US$13 billion worth of capital investments, mostly from foreign wealth funds in Singapore, South Korea and Kuwait.
In the meantime, the business in Merrill had significantly reduced its exposure to collateralised debt obligations, or CDSs.
