Lehman

There is at least one person left who isn't afraid to speak the truth. We only wish the camera would have panned to Dick Fuld's face as Mr. Black was delivering his testimony.

Charlie Gasparino led an informative discussion with Jim Chanos earlier, in which in addition to the trademark topic of China, the two had a rather poignant tete-a-tete on Lehman, Goldman, pervasive financial fraud, state and local finances, i.e., the muni implosion (the stuff that keeps Chanos most up at night), on shorting US debt, on the Volcker rule and, lastly, on China. While for the most part the interview is boilerplate, what caught our attention is Chanos' reluctance to express his feelings toward Goldman in a monetary fashion: he refuses to short anyone he does business with. Indeed, this is the mentality shared by many. However, while Chanos may or may not be sincere in his reasons, most others would refuse to short Goldman primarily as a result of such activity showing up immediately on Goldman's very own Redi. And the last thing a prime broker account, and client of a monopolist wishes, is to be perceived as a rogue. It also explains why Goldman has been calling up alumni and tell them to be good. This is also one more reason to immediately commence Goldman monopoly proceedings with the ultimate intent of breaking up the organization which is certainly big enough to benefit its employees and shareholders, but far too big to either fail, or to survive in the long run.

Today at 11am Barney Frank's Financial Services Committee will begin what will be arguably the most exhilarating live grilling in 2010, with a truly star-studded line up. We expect nothing actionable to come out of this, but with flagrantly conflicting statements between the complicit parties of the SEC and the FRBNY on one hand, and the suspiciously honest Lehman examiner on the other, the show should be a memorable one. Throw in the original whistleblower Matthew Lee, who will be testifying in the same panel as Dick Fuld and William Black, and this could be one of the best hearings in a while. At the very least, it will provide some entertainment for the morts who will once again get the false impression that corrupt Congress cares about their interests. You can watch the hearing live and commercial free here or on C-Span.

With the spate of corruption news out of Wall Street and seismic updates out of Iceland dominating headlines in the past month, everybody forgot about the culprit in the Lehman Repo 105 fraud. Well, almost everybody - the Lehman unsecured creditor committee, or basically the post reorganized equity estate, has decided to seek a probe of Ernst & Young to see "if the estate may have causes of action against the auditor arising out of Lehman's use of a the controversial accounting technique, Repo 105" reports Reuters.

In a nutshell, Bernanke says he was not supervising Lehman, Fuld was not aware of Repo 105, and the SEC had never heard of such a concept.The only person who is not lying, Anton Valukas says that he "found Lehman was significantly and persistently in excess of its own risk limits" and confirms that the SEC is nothing but a pathetic liar lead by incompetent idiots: "we found that the SEC was aware of these excesses and simply acquiesced" and "we believe it is clear that the SEC wasLehman's primary regulator." And just in case the FRBNY thinks it can avoid claims of potentially criminal negligence "
Valukas concludes: "there were "serious lapses" in SEC, federal reserve bank of New York working together to avert Lehman's failure." In other the CEO, the Regulators and the deranged money printer all wash their hands of the fraud that very well may have led to the biggest and most dramatic bankruptcy in history, despite that the independent third party arbiter finds them all guilty of gross incompetence and possibly collusion.

April 19 (Bloomberg) -- Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., which has been investigating whether any companies may have contributed to its bankruptcy, issued at least five subpoenas to investment firms and hedge funds including Goldman Sachs Group Inc., SAC Capital Advisors LP, Greenlight Capital Inc. and Citadel Investment Group LLC, according to court filings. Bankrupt Lehman is conducting its own probes separately from the 2,200-page report by examiner Anton Valukas that was published on March 11.

Earlier today we posted the unredacted version of the 5th volume of the Lehman Examiner report, which unhid all the specifics of the unwind related to Lehman's options and futures positions. There was a reason why Goldman et al felt sufficiently motivated to make the data hidden in the first place. The reason: the banks participating in the liquidation made a killing on the unwind. Yet another involuntary gift from the Lehman creditor estate to the big banks who had the inside scoop on Lehman's books all along, and certainly in the days just before the bankruptcy was announced. The market continues to be one for the banks, and one for "everyone else." And "everyone else" still can not borrow at the Discount Window. Although we are confident that that may change soon. At least in the meantime, Anton Valukas scores one for honesty and transparency, and "concludes that an argument can be made that the transfers at issue were fraudulent." Which means Goldman can likely be sued for ripping off Lehman.

And the winners of the liquidation of the Lehman options and futures book are Goldman Sachs, Barclays, DRW Trading, JPMorgan, and Citadel L.P.

Fox Business reports that the investigation around Lehman is intensifying. Surely the SEC, now generically equated with objects that float around in sewers in formal conversation, has realized it has to do something, anything, to find at least one scapegoat for the financial collapse. Which is why we read with little surprise Gasparino's report that "thee SEC has ramped up its inquiry into Lehman’s fall, particularly after court-appointed bankruptcy examiner Anton Valukas issued a lengthy report stating that Lehman’s top executives were “grossly negligent” in possibly hiding the risky nature of the firm’s finances during its final day." What we find much more interesting is that "yet another investigative agency, the Public Accounting Oversight Board
-- created under the 1992 Sarbanes-Oxley law to investigate and
discipline public accounting firms -- has launched an inquiry into the
role of Lehman’s auditor, Ernst & Young, following the examiner’s
report, which accused the big accounting firm of “professional
malpractice,” for its work in approving accountings techniques Lehman
used during its dying days in the summer of 2008." In the absence of any Wall Street villains, which it is now all too clear have endless diplomatic immunity from prosecution by the corrupt regulators, will the auditor, together with Dick Fuld, be made into the sacrificial lambs? Or will we continue the farce that anything even remotely related to capital markets integrity and reporting is real and valid? Judging by the nearly 60 days of no S&P downticks, the market has answered that question for us.

Banks are busted, all of the big guys were doing the Lehman thing, and it gets worse. I take a look under the hood of the big boys to see what they were hiding. On a side note, as I type this the story is breaking all over the place. Is this the return of true, investigative reporting? I hope so!

More on Lehman Dies While Committing Murder - my rant on regulatory capture has been picked up by independent media. Uh Ohhh! It's Ponzi Videohhhh!

And so the Greek funding crisis shifts to a liquidity crisis yet again. Bankingnews.gr reports that Commerzbank, among many others, is now pulling its repos with Greek banks, essentially killing liquidity in the entire financial system. Cue Lehman Brothers and Sunday CDS trading. At least it's not Friday so OTC traders don't have to worry they will be pulled from their Hamptons retreat. The Greek website is reporting that according to sources, Commerzbank which is one of the biggest repo counterparties to Greek institutions, was dumping bonds in yesterday's sell off. Not only that, but it is now pulling repos, in essence starting a cascade of asset liquidation, in which banks, already experiencing a depositor run, will be forced to sell assets at any prices they can get just to fund their operations for one extra day.

Of course they knew ...

If you were one of the unlucky few caught exposing Barclays' shenanigans over the past year while acquiring Lehman at subfiresale prices (and being sued for that now), you probably were not invited to the annual Lehman Brothers (yes, that's how it will always be know, and always with Brad Rogoff leading the charge) HY conference, this year held at the Phoenician in Scottsdale, AZ. On the other hand, even if you were invited, but like quite a few people, spent all your time in Jenna Jameson's Babe's Cabaret, and need to send your boss a summary of all you"learned" you must be about as pleased as Tim Geithner at a Tax Cheats Anonymous meeting. Fear not - here is the full presentation deck, chock full of cool stuff stuff, pretty graphs and bullish, bullisher, bullishest ideas. So buy all the worst junk before the market crashes again and Lehman still has gobs of crap paper on their books. Cause this time the Repo 105 reacharound just ain't gonna cut it.

Gasparino breaks news that David Einhorn will be brought in as a witness in the upcoming Congressional hearing on the Lehman's fraudulent disclosure as reported by the much discussed Anton Valukas report. According to the Fox Business senior correspondent: "Einhorn through a spokesman declined to comment, but a person close to Einhorn said “it wouldn’t be a surprise” if he was called in some way given his role in exposing Lehman’s problems. A spokesman for US Rep. Barney Frank, the chair of the committee, didn’t return a telephone call for comment." With Tim Geithner most likely present at the hearing, this will be quite a memorable spectacle, which will certainly result in absolutely nothing as usual.