Commonwealth Bank's chief executive picked the Financial Review as the journal of choice through which to argue the bank's, and his, case a little more strongly in the fracas between CBA and Merrill Lynch over who said and did, or did not, do what and when in connection with Tuesday's controversial $2 billion capital raising.In a brief recap, for the archive.CBA at some stage on Tuesday afternoon commissioned Merrill Lynch, in a non-underwritten deal, to market $1.65 billion in new shares at $27 a share intended to complement the $350 million or so already sold by CBA, through Merrill, under a more conservative capital raising announced a week earlier.According to CBA they told Merrill, and either expected Merrill to tell, or told Merrill to tell, institutions about the bank's revised expectations for provisions in the 2009 financial year.Thus there's no contest that CBA elected not to tell the market generally about this any earlier than the ASX announcement late on Tuesday night after Merrill had commitments to the $1.65 billion.Investors cottoned on to the effective downgrade on Tuesday night, CBA's board met early on Wednesday morning; CBA cancelled Merrill's mandate and pulled the capital raising; UBS rode to the rescue with a $26 a share, underwritten offer (approved in a few hours and placed with institutions in less than half an hour), while CBA did finally collect its new capital.Thus CBA had to dilute existing shareholders to the tune of around $60 million and pay the UBS underwriting fee rather than the Merrill placement fee, which at a guesstimate may exceed $30 million.So: where lies the blame and does it matter?Norris, the only principal in the affair speaking on the record, told the AFR: "You're dealing with somebody who you think could execute something that's reasonably simple, to provide investors with disclosure through the draft market announcement. They knew very well they had to provide that before [the placement] was committed."Merrill Lynch opted to restrict comment to a media release, which said "we don't accept [CBA's] characterisation of events."Merrill Lynch, Norris said, "won't be getting any fees and we'll obviously be looking at our legal remedies in regards to the fact the shares have been sold for a dollar less than the agreement."The question of remedies is running hot over the course of a day's debate, starting with doubts that CBA kept the market informed over the course of Tuesday when Merrill Lynch and select investors knew about the higher provisions and profit downgrade.Also of interest is when CBA's management and board formed the view about the increased provisions, since this was also relevant ahead of, and during, the week in which Merrill Lynch was selling shares under the capital raising announced last week.To the extent that the increased provisions reflect what almost all investors and all bankers know anyway - that CBA had to top up provisions in relation to ABC Learning and other well known distressed credits - there's not much ground for investor discontent. On the other