How close did Lehman come to disaster in June?
Senior insiders say that not for a single moment did they fear the worst, such a mountain of cash and near-cash securities is the firm sitting on, so far out has it lengthened the maturities of borrowing that supports its trading activity and so much has it reduced leverage.
Maybe so. Unfortunately, Lehman officials have insisted before that the firm was invulnerable, only to be forced last month into diluting shareholders with a heavily discounted new equity issue as part of a $6 billion capital-raising to cover the bank’s first quarterly loss since going public in 1994.
Even strong capitalization and abundant unencumbered collateral can’t save you, if either your counterparties simply lose confidence and won’t deal with you, or you cannot immediately turn all those near-cash securities into actual cash.
Just ask Bear Stearns.
