A Chronology of Enron Corp.(AP leaves an 11 year gap in the chronology)

AP ^ | 1/10/01 | AP

[Dane]

Thursday January 10 6:14 PM ET

A Chronology of Enron Corp.

By The Associated Press,

A chronology of Enron Corp.:

July 1985 - Houston Natural Gas merges with InterNorth, a natural gas company based in Omaha, Neb., to form the modern-day Enron, an interstate and intrastate natural gas pipeline company with 37,000 miles of pipe.

1989 - Enron begins trading natural gas commodities. Over the years, the company becomes the largest natural gas merchant in North America and the United Kingdom.

This is where the 11 year gap begins.(Betty Curry(Clinton's secretary) must have had her foot on the taping machine for 8 years))

December 2000 - Enron announces that president and chief operating officer Jeffrey Skilling will take over as chief executive in February. Kenneth Lay will remain as chairman. Shares hit 52-week high of $84.87 on Dec. 28.

August 2001 - Skilling resigns after running the company for just six months; Lay becomes CEO again.

Oct. 15 - Lay talks to Commerce Secretary Don Evans while Evans is in Russia leading a trade mission. Commerce officials say the call dealt with an Enron energy project in India and did not cover Enron's financial troubles.

Oct. 16 - Enron reports a $638 million third-quarter loss and discloses a $1.2 billion reduction in shareholder equity, partly related to partnerships run by chief financial officer Andrew Fastow.

Oct. 22 - Enron acknowledges Securities and Exchange Commission (news - web sites) inquiry into a possible conflict of interest related to the company's dealings with the partnerships.

Oct. 24 - Enron ousts Fastow.

Oct. 28 - Lay talks by telephone with Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill to inform O'Neill of the financial problems facing the company, according to O'Neill spokeswoman Michele Davis. Davis said the two also talked on Nov. 8. She said Treasury officials could detect no ripple effects in financial markets from Enron's troubles and O'Neill did nothing to help the company.

Oct. 29 - Lay talks by telephone with Evans. A Commerce spokesman says Lay asked Evans if he could do anything to influence a decision by Moody's Investors Service to downgrade Enron's credit rating. Evans, after talking to the general counsel at the Commerce Department (news - web sites), determines it would not be appropriate to intervene in a decision by a private credit rating agency, according to Commerce spokesman Jim Dyke.

Oct. 31 - Enron announces the SEC inquiry has been upgraded to a formal investigation.

Nov. 8 - Enron files documents with SEC revising its financial statements for past five years to account for $586 million in losses.

Nov. 9 - Dynegy Inc. announces an agreement to buy its much larger rival Enron for more than $8 billion in stock.

Nov. 19 - Enron restates its third-quarter earnings and discloses it is trying to restructure a $690 million obligation that could come due Nov. 27.

Nov. 20 - Concerns about Enron's ability to weather its spiraling financial problems send the company's stock down nearly 23 percent to its lowest level in nearly 10 years.

Nov. 21 - Enron reaches agreement to extend $690 million debt payment.

Nov. 26 - Enron shares fall 15 percent, to $4.01.

Nov. 28 - Dynegy backs out of deal after Enron's credit rating is downgraded to junk bond status. Enron shares plunge below $1 amid the heaviest single-day trading volume ever for a NYSE or Nasdaq-listed stock.

Dec. 2 - Enron files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection; sues Dynegy for wrongful termination of merger.

Jan. 9, 2002 - Justice Department (news - web sites) confirms it has begun a criminal investigation of Enron.

Jan. 10 - The White House discloses Lay sought the administration's help shortly before the company collapsed. The company's auditor, Arthur Andersen LLP, says it has destroyed some Enron documents. Attorney General John Ashcroft (news - web sites), who received campaign funds from the company for his 2000 Senate race, recuses himself from the investigation.

[Dane]

Unfreakin believable.

[Brilliant]

To be expected.

[TLBSHOW]

The missing year's now that is something.

[Michael.SF.]

And to think that some people actually believe that there is a left wing bias to the news.

AP should be commended for digging deep into the past to put together such awesome, awe inspiring, analogy of the history of the largest bankruptcy in history. My hats off to them.

sarcasim off

I think a 10th grade history professor would have given that report a D- (F's are never given of course)

[TomGuy]

Some of the gaps are filled in at this FR post: BACKSTORY: Clinton-Gore, Ron Brown, Lippo, PLA (Enron's path to success) . This whole story might get pretty nasty for both Republicans and Democrats if the whole truth is revealed.

[spycatcher]

Tony Snow or Brit Hume should be all over this bias

[Dane]

Tony Snow or Brit Hume should be all over this bias

The AP got their shots in. One year during the Reagan administration(1985), one year during the GWHB administration(1989) and then all of the sudden to December 2000(after the attempted Gore heist of the election was stopped in it's tracks).

This "article" by the AP should be an appendum to Bernard Goldberg's book, "Bias".

[KC_Conspirator]

Unfreakin believable.

Absolutely. But hearing the crap I heard on MSNBC tonight between Brain Williams and Howie Fineman, its going to get worse. They were already saying, "What did he know and when did he know it" even though both of them had no idea what the "what" was.

The only good analysis was by the economic analyst on MSNBC with Chrissy Matthews who said that Enron and Andersen were the ones to blame.

[solzhenitsyn]

Excellent title. Good catch, Dane.

[Itzlzha]

I guess the name AP means "Amnesia Psychosis"?

Or is is "A$$hole Presstitutes"

Anyway you slice it, they have shown themselves to suck...Bush should pull their credentials and make them do what they do best...make up quotes instead of attending Press Conferences.

[Itzlzha]

Agreed. Good catch, Dane.

[Roger_W_Isom]

GEEEE!!!! How QUAINT!!! A ELEVEN YEAR GAP!!! ALL of CLINTON'S Reign IGNORED!!! AIN'T THIS SWEET???? Guess WHO the OWNER OF THIS RAG VOTED FOR FOLKS!!!!!!

[alloysteel]

What would anyone bet, that most of the destroyed documents relate directly to the connections with the regime of the "Former Occupant of the Oval Office, 1993-2001", and had been mysteriously removed by an operative of said regime within the Arthur Anderson organization? We can count on the Bush Administration to make a full and in-depth disclosure of their involvements, but for the regime of the "Former Occupant of the Oval Office, 1993-2001", it is just a reflexive action to destroy documents, much like a decapitated snake that continues to wriggle.

[AAABEST]

Lol. Good secondary reporting on this bit of absurdity.

[Howlin]

Look!

[anniegetyourgun]

I have such disdain for these so-called journalists.

[topher]

AP does not stand for Associated Press; it stands for the Associated Mess.

[RedBloodedAmerican]

Clinton bloated Enron for his own purposes (there is NOTHING he did that was NOT for his own lust while in Office).

This whole thing is going to backfire and explode all over the Dems. They are about to pierce their own thru.

[Toidylop]

I have such disdain for these so-called journalists pressholes.

Read Bernard Goldberg's BIAS and you know even more ridiculous charge, cooked-up stories, lies from these pressholes. They're no longer journalists but fast becoming more of the leftist propagandists.