“This is a business where the most valuable assets are the people”
I agree that a successful businesses people are their most valuable asset but this business went belly up. The stockholders who put their money at risk are loosing but the failures are getting rewarded.
Seems wrong to me.
You are also correct. Don’t forget, these people were dropping bricks last Monday when they heard of the bankruptcy, so anything is possible. As a mitigating factor, some facets of the business were making money, such as Equity trading. The Mortgage Capital division (which once had 11 companies, including one in Korea) was merged into the Fixed Income division at the beginning of September. The Mtg division is responsible for a significant portion of the bad debt/loans that helped bring Lehman to its knees.
My sources tell me that some people are pretty grim other there, while some others are happy that Barclay is picking up the pieces.
Barclays was smart enough not to buy the whole company last weekend, and so I suspect they were smart enough to pick out the good businesses (with employees still worth keeping) and largely avoid the bad when they ended up making a bid.