The former president of Goldman Sachs and the CEO of the New York Stock Exchange, Thain was named chairman and CEO of Merrill Lynch in December 2007. He departed the firm amid controversy in January 2009, just after Bank of America acquired the firm for $50 billion. After the fallout from Merrill Lynch, he became the CEO of CIT Group in 2010.

Thain attended MIT and Harvard Business School before starting at Goldman Sachs in July of 1979. By the late 1980s, he was running the firm's mortgage securities department, and in the early '90s he moved to Europe to run Goldman's European banking operations. Thain returned to 85 Broad in 1994 after he was tapped to serve as the investment bank's CFO, an appointment that his mentor, Jon Corzine, had championed. But by the time Thain was promoted to president and co-COO five years later, his relationship with Corzine had crumbled. A fierce opponent of the plan to take Goldman public, a position that allied him with Hank Paulson, Thain faced off against Corzine, who was CEO at the time. Thain ultimately lost the argument, of course, and after it became clear that he'd been boxed out of the top job in favor of Lloyd Blankfein, Thain moved on. In 2004, Thain took over the NYSE and over his three-year tenure he presided over some of the most sweeping changes in the exchange's two-century history: Transforming what was once a private club into a publicly-traded entity, introducing advanced new technology, and making the exchange truly global platform. Thain headed up the New York Stock Exchange until November 2007—when he stepped down to assume the top job at Merrill Lynch—following the ouster of Stan O'Neal.

It was Thain's success reviving the NYSE that led him to Merrill Lynch, which was reeling from billions in write-downs and increasing disenchantment. Despite Thain's best efforts to undo the damage and right the ship, by the fall of 2008 it became clear that Merrill would need to pursue a more radical plan to prevent the firm from suffering the same fate as Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers. On September 15, 2008, Merrill announced plans to sell the firm to Bank of America for $50 billion. Thain signed on to become president of global banking, securities and wealth management of the combined company once the deal was complete. Controversy over his decision to pay out $4 billion in bonuses just three days before the acquisition was finalized resulted in Thain's ouster in January 2009. He's since faced embarrassment and a scolding from President Obama for the $1.2 million he spent spiffing up his office when he first took over as Merrill's CEO, and even Andrew Cuomo issued Thain a subpoena for bonuses he received days before the Bank of America takeover. After the dust settled, Thain became CEO of CIT Group in 2010 in an effort to reorganize after it declared bankruptcy in 2009. [Image via Getty]