The Magazine of Corporate Responsibility

Tag Archive for ‘Lehman Brothers’

Crony Capitalism? Hank Paulson’s Extraordinary Meeting

A new report by Bloomberg News suggests that in July 2008, then-Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson met with “a dozen or so hedge-fund managers and other Wall Street executives” to discuss a possible scenario for placing mortgage enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into “conservatorship.” Pulitzer Prize-winner Jesse Eisinger says Paulson’s meeting with his former Wall Street peers draws “a picture of a Treasury Secretary who took care of his buddies while allowing the system to blow up.”

Margin Call: A Small Movie Unveils Big Truths About Wall Street

Reporter Jake Bernstein – who won a Pulitzer Prize for a series of stories on questionable Wall Street practices – says Margin Call is a “briskly paced and marvelously acted” film which tells “the story of a Wall Street that has evolved from an economic helpmate to an economic predator.”

What’s Happened to the Big Players in the Financial Crisis?

Widespread demonstrations in support of Occupy Wall Street have put the financial crisis back into the national spotlight lately. So here’s a quick refresher on what’s happened to some of the main players, whose behavior, whether merely reckless or downright deliberate, helped cause or worsen the meltdown.

Goldman’s Self-Help: Eat, Pay, Trade

Reporter Jesse Eisinger suggests that Goldman Sachs’ announcement last week of a plan to increase transparency and disclosure does not resolve some big questions about the investment banks’ role in financial markets. “Could there be an argument that Goldman should break up into three smaller, more focused companies?” he asks. “It would be better for the financial system, and just might lead to the self-improvement that Goldman is searching for.”

The Year in Wall Street Investigations

It’s been over three years since credit markets started shaking with the early tremors of the subprime crisis, and two years since that spread into a marketwide collapse. Prosecutors, regulators, Congress and journalists have spent the year uncovering the financial shenanigans that brought the market to its knees. It’s been marked by a few blockbuster settlements and more revealing investigations — as well as by some noticeable inaction in the reckoning.

Countrywide: How Artificial Reality Trumped Leadership

In a post-mortem on mortgage lender Countrywide Financial and its former CEO, Angelo Mozilo, columnist Gael O’Brien explains how personal baggage and ego unchecked can drive unintended outcomes – sometimes persuading a leader to turn a deaf ear to criticism and information that’s needed to get back on course.

The Ethical Risk of Business as Usual

Columnist Gael O’Brien wonders what it will take to convince corporate leaders to build into their risk management strategies the capacity to ask crucial questions about ethical liability, as is done with legal liability. Such a step, she says, would be hardly radical and would have the objective of putting ethical conduct on the table as a deliberate outcome.

BOOKS: The Failure of Corporate Boards and the Price We All Pay

If you’re one of the many trying to determine where blame might lie for the financial and economic crises of the last two years, John Gillespie and David Zweig would suggest you look in the corporate boardroom. Their new book – “Money for Nothing: How the Failure of Corporate Boards Is Ruining American Business and Costing Us Trillions” – is rich with unfortunate detail.

BOOKS: Andrew Ross Sorkin’s “Too Big To Fail”

New York Times reporter Andrew Ross Sorkin’s “Too Big to Fail” is too good to put down. Chock-a-block with color and fly-on-the-wall detail, it chronicles bankers and government regulators searching desperately for solutions to the global financial crisis of 2008.