Many trade publications are slaves to the industries they cover. Not The Bond Buyer. The 103-year-old daily stands out for its solid and tenacious coverage of a powerful and little-understood business.

According to a number of Bond Buyer staff members, much of the credit for this goes to Joe Mysak, thirty-six, who joined the paper in 1981, became its editor in 1992, and added the title of publisher in 1993. Under Mysak, The Bond Buyer has been getting rave reviews for its exposes on the role of bond underwriters in political campaigns. One example is Charles Gasparino's coverage of the low-rate campaign loans former New York City Comptroller Elizabeth Holtzman took from outfits that were under consideration by her office for lucrative municipal underwriting contracts. While other media went after Holtzman alone, The Bond Buyer showed that hers was hardly an isolated case.

The paper showed how the bond industry can use consultants to get around its own limits on campaign contributions. It cited the role of White House adviser Rahm Emanuel, who was paid by Goldman, Sachs as a consultant while working as a Clinton fundraiser. And The Bond Buyer published critical pieces on the relationship between Mark Ferber, the investment banker who held sway over many municipal financings in Massachusetts, and William M. Bolger, the head of the state senate and perhaps the most powerful man in Massachusetts politics.

As editor, "Joe was able to inspire the troops, keep us on our toes, and make us work our asses off for him," says a staff member who asked not to be identified. And as publisher, "the money was real good, and circulation was at an all-time record, display advertising was over projections for '93," says another staff member. The Bond Buyer has more than doubled its pages in recent years. It reportedly made a profit of $ 8 million last year.

So why, in late March, was Mysak fired? Why kill the golden goose? Mysak himself says he was "kind of surprised" and compared his situation to that of a baseball pitcher once pulled out of a game by the legendary Casey Stengel: "The pitcher says, 'I'm not tired.' Stengel says, 'I'm tired of you.'" Some staff members think that something as petty as jealousy over the staff's loyalty to Mysak may have played a role in the editor's departure; others believe it was The Bond Buyer's hard reporting that sank him.

The man who did the firing, David Branch, president of the Buyer and its sister publication, The American Banker (the papers are owned by Canada's Thomson chain), says Mysak "was a very good editor [but] we had serious disagreements based strictly on his performance as publisher." Branch says he offered Mysak a chance to keep the editing part of his job, but Mysak says that "by the end of the week that offer was no longer on the table." Branch, who cut his teeth at the Fairchild trades and joined Thomson in 1992, is blamed by some at The Bond Buyer for taking the edge off The American Banker. He's something of an odd duck, a man who several eyewitnesses say used to keep a bust of Adolph Hitler on his desk. Branch denies having such a bust, but managing editor John Doran disputes this, saying he clearly recalls advising Branch to remove it.

To replace Mysak as editor, Branch brought in John Allan, who is respected but close to retirement, and named a separate publisher, Jeff Weiner. Branch's decision to divide Mysak's job, Bond Buyer watchers believe, was based on his desire to consolidate control.

What some of them wonder is, why? After news of the firing went out, one of the first people to call the paper was the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Arthur Levitt. "We were concerned about rumors on why Mysak was replaced," says SEC spokeswoman Jennifer Kimball. The rumors that David Clapp -- the partner in charge of the municipal bonds department at Goldman, Sachs -- had heard prompted him to complain to The Bond Buyer in a letter that he feared "that the newspaper might cease to be the hard-hitting and influential force that it has become in our industry." Clapp says his letter resulted in a visit from Branch and his new publisher, who asked about how the paper is perceived and for suggestions as to how to shape it. Clapp says he often disagreed with Mysak's approach at The Bond Buyer, but "we're not supposed to agree."

Clearly, not everyone in the municipal bond business shares Clapp's tolerance for the investigative-minded editor. According to an anonymous source quoted in the New York Post, traders at Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, a sometime Bond Buyer target, "got on their feet and cheered" when news of Mysak's firing broke.

The celebration may have been premature, however. Mysak has joined Jim Grant, publisher of Grant's Interest Rate Observer, where he is setting up a new municipal bond report.

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