Bank of America Snags Charles Holliday of Du Pont. Why?

Bank of America (BAC) announced the appointment of Charles Holliday Chairman of Du Pont (DD) to Bank of America’s board. Sounds like Bank of America got a good man at a difficult time. What’s in it for Charles Holliday? Bank of America is in danger of being declared a criminal organization. The SEC cannot get judges to bless agreements and are required to go to trial with proper rules of evidence. There will be much to do for new board members. Much of it will be messy legal issues and not strategic business issues that you would expect a board to deal with.

When you finish being confused about Charles Holliday’s rationale start thinking about why Du Pont would be OK with this. The amount of time he will spend away from Du Pont business without any tangible benefit to Du Pont will be enormous.