Bank of America and two of its top former executives have been charged with duping their shareholders about losses at Merrill Lynch and misleading the government to win $20bn in public funds.

Ken Lewis, former Bank of America chief executive, and Joe Price, the bank's former chief financial officer, are named in the charges by Andrew Cuomo, the attorney-general of New York.

After more than a year of investigation, Mr Cuomo's office alleged that Mr Price misled BofA's general counsel, who was subsequently fired, as to the magnitude of Merrill's losses in the fourth quarter of 2008, to persuade him to agree that Merrill's losses did not need to be disclosed to shareholders prior to a December 5 vote on the proposed merger with the investment bank.