With its share price collapsing, and ultimately going for $2, was Bear Stearns too big to fail, if only just? JPMorgan is buying Bear for just one-fifteenth of the price the shares closed at on Friday, and down from $172.61 last year. The backing of the Federal Reserve certainly made it easier for JP Morgan to take on the great unknowns of Bear’s balance sheet. The argument has long been that there are institutions that could shatter financial systems if they were to collapse. These require state support when they are against the ropes. Bear, the fifth-largest U.S. investment bank, seems to have been one of those institutions in the Fed’s eyes — but how many other banks can count on a blank check if they step in to buy a sinking ship?

CME Group, the world’s largest derivatives exchange, forged a definitive agreement to buy energy and precious metals mart NYMEX for about $9.4 billion. The deal marks the latest merger in the quickly consolidating U.S. and global financial exchanges. The terms of the deal remained unchanged from CME’s original bid on January 28, but the overall price tag dropped from the original $11 billion offer due to the fall of CME’s stock price. The deal values NYMEX at about $100.30 per share.

International Paper has agreed to pay $6 billion in cash to buy the packaging and recycling unit of Weyerhaeuser, the timber and forest products company. The transaction includes nine containerboard mills and affects 14,300 employees. Because the transaction is a purchase of assets rather than of stock, IP said it will realize a tax benefit that has an estimated net present value of around $1.4 billion. Taking this benefit into account, the net purchase price is about $4.6 billion.

Semiconductor equipment maker Axcelis Technologies rejected a sweetened $615.6 million takeover bid by Japan’s Sumitomo Heavy Industries, saying it undervalued the company and failed to compensate it for the future potential of new products. Axcelis said it was willing to meet with Sumitomo to discuss their joint venture in Japan, known as SEN. It said it has explored in the past ways to combine Axcelis and SEN, and said it would be willing to meet with Sumitomo to discuss ways to resolve the joint venture relationship.

Plastics company A. Schulman said it had hired UBS Investment Bank as an adviser to explore strategic alternatives, after a dissident shareholder succeeded last month in getting board representation. In January, Ramius Capital claimed victory in a proxy battle after shareholders elected two of its candidates as directors.

U.S. drugmaker Bristol-Myers Squibb is sounding out potential buyers for a possible sale of its Mead Johnson baby formula food business for $7 billion to $9 billion, the Financial Times said. The newspaper, quoting people close to the situation, said Bristol had tentatively approached PepsiCo, Danone, Nestle, Kraft, and HJ Heinz to test the appetite for a formal auction of the unit. Danone would be a natural: Bristol’s recently appointed CFO sold a baby food company to them when he worked at Numico.

Wilbur Ross, a billionaire investor who made his fortune buying businesses in distressed industries, said his firm agreed to acquire H&R Block’s mortgage servicing business for $1.1 billion. W.L. Ross & Co will buy Option One Mortgage Servicing, which sends out bills and collects mortgage payments, through his AH Mortgage Acquisition Co vehicle. It is the latest in a series of mortgage and financial services purchases by Ross, who will offer a “substantial portion” of employees jobs with comparable terms. The deal is expected to close by May 30.