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AFTER AMERICAN investment bank Lehman Brothers failed in September 2008, the largest bankruptcy in US history had unforeseen adverse consequences. It hastened the onset of the worst global financial crisis since the 1930s. Lehman’s sudden collapse quickly destabilised international financial markets. As liquidity dried up, banks became reluctant to lend to each other and they found it more difficult to finance their borrowings. Within two weeks the Irish Government, fearing a collapse of the domestic banking system, was forced to act. It guaranteed the debts and the deposits of the State’s largest banks and building societies.
The US bank, a 158-year-old company that had survived the American civil war, two world wars and the Great Depression, was the author of its own downfall. Anton Valukas, examiner of the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, has outlined that fully in a nine-volume report on the bank’s failure. Lehman had sought to conceal its financial difficulties from investors by presenting a wholly misleading picture of its financial condition. The bank, by switching temporarily $50 billion in bad assets on and off its balance sheet, had created a false impression of its financial standing. Lehman, a highly leveraged financial institution, was made to seem far healthier by accounting practices which masked its weak financial position. These “materially misleading” gimmicks also misled investors, rating agencies, financial regulators and even the company’s own board of directors. The examiner found the “balance sheet manipulation was intentional, for deceptive purposes”.
