The end of the week brought a flurry of news out of the banking industry. Here's a quick rundown: 

Bank of America's deal for Merrill Lynch was a surprise to everyone, even its board. Bloomberg reports : "When Bank of America Corp.'s board met to approve the acquisition of an investment bank on Sept. 15, 2008, members thought they were going to buy Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., not Merrill Lynch & Co., according to New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo." The bank then bought Merrill after examining its books for just 25 hours. Not exactly what one would consider serious due diligence.

J.P. Morgan and Banco Santander wanted to pick over the bones of troubled banks in an orderly fashion. TheStreet.com uncovered an email regarding a meeting involving J.P. Morgan's CEO Jamie Dimon and Santander boss Emilio Botin in which the two appear to agree not to compete over acquisition targets. "It is important to have an open dialogue with them, as Santander would not pursue any of these opportunities if JPMorgan were to do the same (can't compete on price with JPMorgan for an acquisition in the USA). But Santander would probably hire JPMorgan as advisor if we are not going after them," J.P. Morgan investment banker Jose Cerezo wrote in the email. It's unclear whether this would be considered collusion.

And speaking of Jamie Dimon...Banking's golden boy (if there really can be such a thing at the moment) was awarded a compensation package worth about $16 million for 2009, a year in which the bank reported $11.7 billion in profit. He will not take a cash bonus. Some have speculated that Dimon's pay package may set the bar for what banking's current villain, Goldman Sach's Lloyd Blankfein, will get to take home. There had previously been reports pegging Blankfein's comp around $100 million. Goldman denied those reports.