Bankruptcy is akin to having your organs harvested by a bunch of black market organ dealers. There was a breakdown of the bankruptcy legal fees for Lehman Brothers in the Wall-Street Journal:
“Weil, Lehman’s main law firm, earned $49.63 million for the period from Lehman’s Sept. 15, 2008 filing date to the end of January, according to the judge’s order filed late Thursday. That compares with requested total fees for September-January of $55.14 million, when including the 10% held back by the court.
The awarded fees amount to about $357,000 a day for Weil, or nearly $15,000 an hour. For that, Miller helped the fallen financial giant unload most of its deteriorating assets to Barclays in a matter of days, one of the speediest bankruptcy deals on record.”
We all know that bankruptcy provides the vultures of the legal world with a rotting carcass to pick at, but I find the Lehman case even more egregious. The sale of all of Lehman’s good assets which include its brand, its people, its intellectual property to Barclays for a measly $250M outrageous (Barclayspaid $2.5B for the buildings and data centers). The one thing that I have learned over this financial crisis is that any “deal” or “transaction” that happens quickly is lined with shady and unethical practices. The Bear Stearns overnight pillage, Wamu being handed to JP Morgan, Wachovia handed to Wells Fargo, Lehman handed to Barclays…etc. And to add icing to the mud cake that was served to the stakeholders of Lehman: lawfirm Weil was rewarded for its speedy work. I wonder if Barclays paid Weil on the sidelines as well…
What is the dire rush anyway?
