Stock Futures to open dramatically down

The economy has not recovered yet. I saw Alan Greenspan say we are not in a recession and thinks the bottom of the market is next year. He is saying this while all the financial giants are collapsing.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Bank of America agreed to buy Merrill Lynch in an all-stock deal valued at as much as $50 billion, according to several reports.

The purchase price would value the company at more than $29 a share, at least a 70% premium from Merrill’s closing price on Friday of $17.05.

The acquisition comes as Wall Street awaits the fate of battered investment bank Lehman Brothers (LEH, Fortune 500) – increasingly thought to be a liquidation.

Throughout the weekend, Bank of America (BAC, Fortune 500) was considered a potential acquirer of Lehman, though those discussions had broken off by Sunday afternoon.

Like Lehman, Merrill Lynch (MER, Fortune 500) has been suffering from bad real estate bets and its stock price has been punished severely, losing 27% last week. Shares are down 65% this year.

Concerns had been growing that Merrill would need to take more writedowns and raise more capital to shore up its balance sheet. Merrill has posted net losses of more than $17 billion over the past four quarters.

Tomorrow will be a wild rollercoaster ride on wall street. These are the dominoes falling from the US Housing Bubble Burst that Bush, Bernanke, and Paulson help create right at the beginning of his 1st term in office.

The stock futures right now are: