Lehman Brothers survival

The American doyen of letters Gore Vidal in a Sunday 'New York Times' Book Review issue when asked about speaking truth to power, suggested readers subscribe to the 'Financial Times of London'. And he's right. Today's issue [11 June 2008] reports that Lehman are in negotiation with Korean bankers for a bailout and a stake in the 4 largest American bank. Citibank which ain't unaffected by the subprime Ponzi scheme meltdown, but certainly in better health than Lehman, estimate that Lehman still has us$65000m or us$65bn in subprime debt on its balance sheet. And so, we see Lehman the ghost of Bear Stearns hovering over Lehman. Bear, too, sought to tap into hefty Asian coffers, not in Korea, but in China. China's Citic Group got cold feet and left Bear hanging in the wind and forced to give up the ghost to JPMorgan Chase. Laser like attention to Lehman is driving down share prices and bad mouthing its management will result by 2009 of another huge bank failure on Wall Street, 18Brumaire is willing to believe.