Bear Stearns moniker expected to go the way of the dodo bird

Another venerable name is expected to fade away into extinction some time after Thursday's shareholder vote that will seal the merger deal between Bear Stearns and JP Morgan.  The name is expected to be removed from the Bear headquarters within weeks and won't be replaced with JP Morgan's for a time -- a “purposeful delay”, according to someone said to be an insider, so that it doesn't look like JP Morgan is dancing on the grave of the dearly departed....

Bear shareholders are widely expected to approve the firm’s shotgun marriage to J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. at a special meeting Thursday morning, and it won’t be long before the Bear name vanishes after being a Wall Street fixture for 85 years.

“The name generally will go away,” says a J.P. Morgan insider. “What kind of brand value does Bear Stearns have at this point, anyway?”

One person familiar with the matter said it’s possible that the Bear name could survive through the firm’s retail brokerage operation, a relatively tiny business that generated less than $150 million in commissions last year. The retail unit, though barely known among the general public, is one of the few areas where Bear does not overlap with J.P. Morgan.

J.P. Morgan says bye-bye to the Bear - Crain's NY