Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., a diversified, global financial-services firm founded in 1850 by Henry Lehman, a Jewish-German-American businessman, son of a Bavarian Cattle merchant is going belly up. The troubled firm was in negotiations for a buy-out by Barclays and Bank of America (amongst others). Those negotiations fell through today and it looks like the firm is not going to survive. This will throw 26,000 people out of work and wreak quite some havoc on the financial markets.
“I think the most likely option for Lehman is a bankruptcy filing by the end of the day today,” said Peter Cohan of the consulting firm Peter Cohan & Associates… Barry Ritholtz of the research firm FusionIQ said a bankruptcy could mean further financial market turmoil… “We are now on bankruptcy watch, with the midnight hour as the key line in the sand.” he said. “The Wall Street open Monday in the event of a Lehman failure will be wild.” … According to some analysts, the talks on Lehman Brothers were snagged over whether the Federal Reserve would guarantee a deal with Lehman’s troubled mortgage securities as was done to avert a meltdown earlier this year of Bear Stearns, bought by JPMorgan Chase.
It’s going to be a blood bath tomorrow on Wall Street. Yikes.
Larry
9/15/2008
Governor Lehman.. where be you?
And so goes one of the last surviving brand names of the “OUR CROWD (Stephen Birmingham coined the word) NYC German Jewish families of the early 20th Century… Names who set up their own banking firms, married within themselves to create dynasties, and quietly fight anti Jewish sentiments in America. Names like Seligman, Guggenheim, Loeb, Kuhn, Bache, Lewisohn Abraham as well as Straus, Goldman with Sachs, and even Altschul (now I think with MTV and not with banking hehe).
DiGiTaL
9/15/2008
Wamu is next on the chopping block. The outlook is grim, heading for the inevitable depression. Anyone get the feel this can end up like Pre WWII Germany? My financial advice, by property in Israel.
ck
9/15/2008
Merryl Lynch got eaten by Bank of America. WAMU? I think they can hold off a little longer.
Yael
9/17/2008
This is really sad. 5,000 jobs lost in London and its not helping the UK economy at all.
larry
9/17/2008
Have you ever been at the NYC UJA Hanukkah Dinner where the top Wall Street leaders “call cards” and Ace Greenberg pledges a million, as do Tisch and Zicklin and others?
I have.. and it is quite an experience.
The rule of thumb is that for every drop of 10% in Wall Street bonus payments, the State of New York loses over $700 million in tax revenue.
Just think of the freezing effect this has on Jewish charities and philanthropy endowments.
They say that in Virginia Beach/Norfolk, after the Orthodox Jweish investment pyramid scheme scandal this year, that the Jewish Federation had to cut programs and services since their benefactors lost so much money.
So as Wall Street sinks and staffers lose jobs and investors lose assets, Jewish social services (sorry to be so parochial) will lose funds