As her obsession grew, Ms. Wong left her job as a general counsel of Merrill's international privateclientgroup and set up her own business consulting operation.
Darryl Lewis' options odyssey began in 1998, when, he says, he was approached by a Merrill (nyse: MER - news - people )broker, Jeanine Luteijn , who introduced herself as a member of Merrill's PrivateClientGroup and dropped the name of a Microsoft colleague.