Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (LEH)

The Michigan State Housing Development Authority, which sued Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (LEHMQ) in bankruptcy court over derivatives transactions, said it is seeking to move its suit to a higher court.

The Lehman bankruptcy judge’s interpretation of swap contracts is “surpassingly broad” and requires U.S. District Court review because it has ramifications for international securities markets, the authority said yesterday in court papers. The global over-the-counter derivatives market is valued at $601 trillion by the Bank for International Settlements.

The Michigan agency is “one of many” derivatives trading partners of Lehman disputing who gets paid first on a swap agreement as a result of a previous ruling by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge James Peck, it said in the filing. While that case involving a Bank of New York Mellon Corp. (BK) trustee unit was settled, Peck’s ruling stands, it said.

“The bankruptcy court continues to adhere to the reasoning of BNY Trustee -- while the correctness of that decision remains very much unresolved,” it said, referring to Peck’s ruling.

In the BNY case, Peck ruled in Lehman’s favor, saying that a swap agreement written to protect both parties from default by the other party didn’t apply under bankruptcy law. He used a similar principle earlier this month when he refused to dismiss a Lehman suit against an entity known as Ballyrock ABS CDO 2007- 1 Ltd., the Michigan agency said.

Housing Agency’s Work
The authority sells bonds to raise money to help fund home mortgages and rental housing developments. It struck a swap agreement with a Lehman unit in 2000 to offset its interest rate risk as a borrower, according to the filing. The agreement allowed either party to end the transaction if the other defaulted, it said.

After the Lehman unit filed for bankruptcy, the state agency terminated the agreement by wiring the $36.3 million owed to the unit. Lehman later made an “improper demand” for payment of a $2.4 million semi-annual premium from the agency’s bank and failed to return the money even though it admitted the transfer was a mistake, according to the filing.

Peck put on hold the housing agency’s lawsuit -- and a Lehman countersuit -- making it impossible for the agency to defend itself, it said.

The lawsuit is Michigan State Housing Development Authority v. Lehman Brothers Derivative Products, 09-01728, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan). The bankruptcy case is In re Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., 08- 13555, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).


http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-18/...higan-agency-says-1-.html  

.Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. (LEHMQ) will pay investors A$98.5 million ($104 million) to settle a derivatives dispute that divided courts in the U.S. and the U.K., according to an Australian trustee who sued on behalf of investors.

Lehman agreed to pay holders of credit-linked notes issued by Mahogany Capital Ltd. as much as 85 cents on each dollar invested in Series I notes that were backed by an Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. bond and as much as 69 cents on the dollar for a Series II note backed by a Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc bond, said Chris Green, group executive at Perpetual Corporate Trust in Sydney.

“Those were the assets we were fighting over,” Green said today in a phone interview, referring to the bonds backing the notes. “The question was who got first dibs.”

Lehman had argued it was entitled to the assets, while Perpetual maintained the money should be returned to investors. Courts in the U.K. ruled against Lehman, which is seeking money to pay creditors, while a U.S. bankruptcy judge last year ruled in Lehman’s favor. Allowing an appeal, a U.S. district judge said Lehman had used the lower-court decision as “leverage” in talks with other parties over billions of dollars of similar transactions.

Divided Rulings
The divided court rulings mean there is still no consensus on who has priority in derivative transactions in which a counterparty defaults, Green said. Billions of dollars with multiple counterparties remain in dispute in the Lehman bankruptcy, he said.

About 1,000 retail investors including Australian charities and local councils will be getting checks within the next month, Green said. Details of the settlement were reported earlier by The Australian newspaper.

A Lehman entity known as Saphir Finance Plc sold A$121 million in the two series of Mahogany notes to Australian investors. Money raised from the Mahogany sale was used to buy further Saphir notes, according to Perpetual.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-17/...ustralia-104-million.html  

The $28 billion Soros Fund Management disclosed in SEC filings that it had sold virtually all of its holdings in the SPDR Gold Trust (GLD). At the end of the March, the Soros Fund, run by renown George Soros, owned only 49,400 shares of GLD after selling 4.7 million shares in the first quarter.

Rumors of GLD liquidation by Soros has been public for weeks now and may have contributed to the recent decline in the price of gold.

George Soros is one of the world's most prominent hedge fund investors with a great track record, but like any investor, some of his stock picks have been disastrous. In late 2007, as financial stocks were swooning due to disclosures of huge mortgage loan losses, Soros acquired shares of Countrywide Financial. In the quarter ending September 30, 2007, the Soros fund picked up 1.8 million shares of Countrywide, acquired at an estimated average price of $25. As financial markets collapsed in 2008, Countrywide's price plunged and it was ultimately acquired by Bank of America at $7 per share.

As markets plunged in 2008, Soros apparently could not comprehend the severity of the financial crisis. During the quarter ending June 30, 2008, Soros increased his stake in Lehman Brothers to almost 9.5 million shares from only 10,000 at the end of March. By mid August 2008, Lehman Brothers stock had plunged 80% on the year as losses on toxic debt holdings climbed into the billions. Shortly thereafter, when the Fed refused to bail out Lehman Brothers, they collapsed on September 15, 2008.

Time will tell if the decision by Soros to liquidate his gold position turns out to be another disastrously ill timed move.

Meanwhile, hedge fund manager John Paulson, who made billions during the financial crisis by shorting subprime mortgages has not reduced his massive $4.4 billion investment in the SPDR Gold Trust.

Soros may be playing the role of a short term trader while Paulson waits for the big payoff as he did with his bets on subprime mortgages.   Trader sentiment in both commodities and precious metals had become massively bullish  and with markets vulnerable to a sell off, perhaps Soros simply decided to take some profits short term.

Ultimately, market fundamentals suggest much higher gold prices and it would not be surprising to see the Soros Fund reestablish gold positions at some later date.

http://goldandsilverblog.com/...ide-right-before-their-collapse-0243/  

Financial giant Pacific Investment Management Co. accrued more than $4.5 billion in Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. debt in the decade before the investment bank's collapse and often paid a premium for it, including a purchase at better than 100 cents on the dollar less than four months before Lehman's Sept. 15, 2008, bankruptcy filing.

Following the Chapter 11 filing, however, Pimco joined with other deal-seeking investors, including Paulson & Co., and snapped up debt for pennies on the dollar, according to papers recently filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan.

Pimco is now aligned with Paulson and several other Lehman creditors that hold significant amounts of the bank's senior unsecured debt and are pushing for an alternative creditor-repayment plan that would boost their recoveries at the expense of the creditors of Lehman's subsidiaries.

Specifics about the holdings of Paulson and the 12 other members of the group were divulged late last month, but Pimco withheld those details until Friday. The group's members had to report when and for how much they bought and sold Lehman debt to comply with bankruptcy rules.

According to a Dow Jones analysis of the newly released accounting, Pimco regularly bought and sold Lehman debt since 1999 and paid an average transaction price of 98.7 cents on the dollar to acquire its billions in senior unsecured debt before the bankruptcy.

Pimco, a unit of Allianz SE, continued to invest in Lehman debt even as the investment bank neared failure. As recently as May 21, 2008, Pimco paid above-par prices to acquire millions of dollars in Lehman debt. And just four days before the bankruptcy filing, Pimco paid $19.6 million to acquire $24.4 million in Lehman debt.

Following the bankruptcy filing, Pimco quickly moved to dump some of its Lehman debt, selling off $239.8 million in claims for $28.9 million—about 12 cents on the dollar—over the next 25 days. Then Pimco itself went bargain hunting, buying back $117.8 million in debt at 8.6 cents on the dollar on Oct. 10, 2008.

In the time since, Pimco has both bought and sold Lehman's unsecured debt.

More
Document: Pimco's Lehman Holdings
.Pimco's current total holdings of $4.65 billion in Lehman debt, including $4.2 billion senior unsecured debt, make it the largest claims holder among the 14 creditors proposing the alternative Chapter 11 plan for Lehman. Paulson is the next largest, holding about $4.2 billion in Lehman debt as of late April.

Pimco's participation with the group, which also includes several municipalities and the California Public Employees' Retirement System, adds considerable weight to the contingent. By holding a sizeable portion of Lehman's debt, the group has a louder voice in creditor-payment plan negotiations and related court battles.

But the firm Bill Gross founded, however, has looked to scale back its Lehman investment recently. Since the beginning of 2010, Pimco had reduced its stake in Lehman's senior unsecured debt by $352.7 million, netting about 23 cents on the dollar for those claims, the analysis shows.

Pimco didn't immediately respond to requests for comment Monday.

The group including Paulson and Pimco offered its Chapter 11 plan for Lehman in December of last year. That proposal would pay themselves and other unsecured creditors of the Lehman holding company 24 cents on the dollar for their debt.

Lehman's most recently filed plan offered those same creditors a 21.4% recovery if they vote in favor of the plan.

A preliminary hearing on those two plans and a third proposed by a group of subsidiary creditors, including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. affiliates and Silver Point Capital LP, is scheduled for June 28.

http://online.wsj.com/article/...2748703509104576327440394557176.html  

The estate of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. is looking to sell its stake in the former International Toy Center building, seeking an exit from a property that has ridden the rocky ups and downs of the Manhattan real-estate market in the past four years.

The bank and partner L&L Holding Co. paid $480 million in May 2007 for the mostly vacant 800,000-square-foot building at 200 Fifth Ave. It subsequently saw its value plummet with the market through 2009 to the point where it was viewed to be worth less than its mortgage of approximately $390 million.


Krisanne Johnson for The Wall Street Journal

Lehman is seeking actions on 200 Fifth Ave., left, and 1107 Broadway.
.But the Manhattan office market has improved significantly since, and the owners signed multiple new tenants last year. Now the failed investment bank believes its equity stake— roughly 90%, according to people familiar with the matter—has significant value above the debt once again. L&L, led by David Levinson, intends to stay in the property.

The planned equity sale by the Lehman estate marks an uncommon real-estate disposition by the bank, whose assets are being overseen by restructuring firm Alvarez & Marsal.

Lehman sought bankruptcy protection in 2008 and its estate has generally been reticent to sell off the billions in real-estate debt and equity positions in a bet that the market would improve.

In many cases, Lehman has even put new money into its assets in an attempt to salvage value.

In March, for example, Lehman asked for court permission to invest an additional $25 million in 25 Broad Street, an incomplete condominium conversion project, and 45 Broad Street, a development site. The bank was the lender on the two adjacent properties in Lower Manhattan, and has filed to foreclose on both properties.

Lehman now points to 200 Fifth, which used to primarily house toy firms, manufacturers and showrooms, as a vindication of its approach.

Jeff Fitts, an Alvarez & Marsal managing director, said in a statement that the building is "a perfect example of how actively stabilizing our real-estate assets in lieu of selling in a down market has made sense."

The firm's stake is being marketed by brokerage Eastdil Secured.  

After Lehman and L&L bought the building, they put more than $120 million into a renovation in an attempt to reposition the property, which was built around 1909.

They signed one tenant, the Grey Group, for 370,000 square feet in the property, before the economy soured in 2008, leaving most of the building's space unspoken for and not producing income.

The building's fortunes shifted last year when Tiffany & Co. signed a lease to take 260,000 square feet of space. The building is now more than 80% leased.

At the same time, there has been a surprisingly fast rebound of prices paid for Manhattan office buildings, as investors are focusing their money on major cities considered safe long-term investments, such as New York.

While Lehman's portfolio has benefited from this, the bank, which had one of the most active real-estate divisions on Wall Street at the market's peak, has other real-estate investments scattered around Manhattan that are still troubled.

Just across the street from 200 Fifth Ave., for instance, Lehman financed the purchase of 1107 Broadway, a 16-story building that Tessler Developments bought in 2007. Tessler had planned to convert that building, which was also part of the former International Toy Center, to luxury condos.

Lehman has filed a foreclosure action against the property claiming that Tessler failed to repay a $137 million loan in 2008 as the financing markets shut down. The bank has scheduled a foreclosure auction for June 6, according to a public notice.

http://online.wsj.com/article/...2748703509104576325671344192488.html  

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/...1-2011-05-05?reflink=MW_news_stmp  

A federal bankruptcy judge today approved a $144 million deal between New York State and Lehman Brothers Holdings to settle the firm’s tax debt – and at least one Brooklyn Assemblyman has an idea for how the state should use the money.

Our Glenn Blain reports:

“I am saying that those monies should be used to restore the cuts to education,” said Assemblyman William Colton, who has frequently complained about the state’s inability to collect all the back taxes owed it.

As Reuters reported today, "The payment will settle claims that initially amounted to $1.17 billion for alleged underpayments between 1992 and 2008. The accord was approved by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge James Peck at a hearing in Manhattan."

Colton said the money should be directed to the city and other high-needs districts that suffered under the budget approved by Gov. Cuomo and state lawmakers in March. That budget cut education aid by more than $1 billion.

“We cannot let that money just fall in the dark hole of the budget,” he said.

“It is money that was not anticipated, and that money should be used to restore some of the drastic cuts to New York City.”



http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/...ent-to-fund-schools  

Several Carl Icahn-controlled entities are fighting Lehman Brothers Holding Inc.'s /quotes/comstock/11i!lehmq LEHMQ 0.00% attempt to reduce their claims against the failed investment bank by $16.4 million.

In papers filed Wednesday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan, those Icahn-led creditors said Lehman is seeking to level an 18% reduction on more than $92 million in claims "simply on their say so."

A reduction in the debt claims that Icahn holds against Lehman could ultimately lead to the billionaire investor seeing less of a recovery from the Chapter 11 case.

Last month, Lehman objected to $7.6 million in claims that the Icahn entities made against the parent company and $8.8 million in claims against the bank's derivatives unit, Lehman Brothers Special Finance. Lehman said the amounts listed on Icahn's proof of claims "are greater than the fair, accurate and reasonable values" of the claims themselves.

The Icahn entities, however, said Lehman submitted no documentation or other evidence in support of its objection.

They say their claims should be accepted on their face unless Lehman is able to produce sufficient evidence that such claims are not valid.

"The burden of proof does not shift to the claimant until the objector has first met its burden...by providing sufficient evidence," the Icahn entities said.

Those creditors say the lack of evidence offered in court papers is consistent with Lehman's behavior in negotiations with the Icahn entities. They said Lehman proposed settlements in talks without offering any methodology or supporting documents for Lehman's internal projection of the claim amounts.

In contrast, the Icahn entities say they've offered up a variety of supporting evidence for their claims, including third-party valuation data and references to the original agreement from which the claims arise.

A Lehman spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.

The claims arise from several derivative deals various Icahn Partners entities entered into with Lehman in February 2008 and an April 2008 deal between Lehman Brothers Special Finance and Icahn's High River LP.

Lehman's protest to the Icahn payment demand is just one of many creditors' claims that the investment bank has objected to recently. Lehman is trying to get a handle on the total amounts it owes creditors as it works toward seeking approval for its liquidation plan.

A preliminary hearing on Lehman's plan and two rival plans proposed by creditor groups is set for June 28.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/...mand-for-18-claims-cut-2011-05-19  

This post was based in June A/L...Just bumping it up for Kimmy...

Anyway, The asset as of last December A/L is now 250.7B, The Liability is 310.8B, Investment in Affiliate is -46.6B.

Let us make a little analysis:

The Asset can be written in more simple way like this:

Total:.............................297.3B
Investment in Affiliates:..-46.6B
Balance:.........................250.7B

Liability:.................310.8B

Deficit:....................60.1B


Actually: The real asset was 297.3B with the 46.6B being set aside as a reserve for a investment obligation. If for example, The 46.6B is recovered with no loss, Then it will be like this:

Asset:......297.3B
Liability:..310.8B
Deficit:.....13.5B


Remember The 25B claim by Bankhaus that was negotiated and settled at 6.6B?

Let us apply it:

Asset:...... 297.3B
Bankhaus:......6.6B
Balance:.....290.7B

Now, You would expect that the 25B claim will be removed from the Liability..Right?

Liability:...... 310.8B
Bankhaus:....... 25.0B
Liability:...... 285.8B

Balance (equity): 4.9B

How about another intercompany Claim like 27B from LBT? This is very similar to 25B Bankhaus claim and still being negotiated.

Also, The 6.1B claim by Ambac?

Then, 11B coming from SIPA?

Then, about 10B from NOL?

LOL! What are you going to say Kimmy?  

http://messages.finance.yahoo.com/...02&tid=261486&mid=261750  

HONG KONG—Investors in Hong Kong who lost money from minibonds linked to collapsed investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. voted overwhelmingly to accept an offer to recoup up to 96.5% of their investments, according to PriceWaterhouseCoopers, receiver of the products.



http://online.wsj.com/article/...22018.html?ru=yahoo&mod=yahoo_hs  

A record number of bankruptcy claims against Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. traded hands last month as buyers grew more optimistic about how much they could recover on the claims as the failed investment bank is wound down.

April saw 380 claims traded for a combined face value of $1.8 billion, said broker dealer SecondMarket Holdings Inc., which owns a platform that facilitates buying and selling of such claims. Lehman Brothers, once one of the biggest investment banks on Wall Street, went bust in September 2008.

That beat the previous monthly record of 308 claims in July 2010, when large institutions unloaded batches of claims tied to structured notes, SecondMarket said. The claims sold then had a combined face value of $5.6 billion.

"Prices have been trending up incrementally," said Andrew Gottesman, head of bankruptcy claims at SecondMarket. "There is an expectation of a higher return from the bankruptcy estate."

Around $42 billion of Lehman claims have traded since the firm filed for protection from creditors under Chapter 11 of the federal bankruptcy code, making it by far the most popular bankruptcy case among traders of distressed assets. Lehman claims represented 83% of the dollar amount of all claims transferred in April.

Lehman claims are sold by companies that believe they are owed money by the defaulted bank, and are typically bought by hedge funds and banks that believe the value of those claims will rise between now and when Lehman's bankruptcy case is closed.

Claims tied to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., or LBHI, now sell for around 18 to 21 cents on dollar, up from 12 to 16 cents in November 2009, before which trading was thin, Mr. Gottesman said.

Likewise, claims tied to Lehman Brothers Special Financing, a subsidiary whose obligations were guaranteed by LBHI, now go for 28 to 31 cents on the dollar, up from 18 to 20 cents over the same period.

It is unclear what the value of the claims will ultimately be; in theory, they could be worth nothing depending on how the case shakes out in court. But assuming the recoveries are higher than what the buyers paid, some may have nearly doubled their money.

Any one of the 20 buyers that snapped up combined claims on LBSF and the claims on LBHI guarantees in November 2009 would have paid out 30 cents on the dollar and now hold claims now worth as much as 52 cents on the dollar.

A hearing is set for June 28 in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, where Lehman as the debtor will present its creditor payment plan, enabling voters on the plan to decide whether they will accept or reject it.

Kimberly Macleod, a Lehman spokeswoman, declined to comment on the claims trading.

In January, Lehman disclosed that outstanding adjusted claims against the firm totaled about $369 billion as of the end of 2010, or $319 billion for LBHI alone. Likely allowed claims amounted to $322 billion, of which LBHI claims were $272 billion. The firm estimated its net recoveries at $60.1 billion.

http://online.wsj.com/article/...2748704904604576335761907122614.html  

www.ariva.de/forum/Börse-FRANKFURT-435912?pnr=10583636#jump10583636

Bitte dort aber unbedingt das "Klein-Gedruckte" (unter Punct "ACHTUNG") beachten.

LG: Teras.

kann jemand in drei Worten erklären was Jerri  uns da eingestellt hat?  

weiß einer was bei WAMU passiert ist?  

Wie weit könnte die laufen?  

 

nur der sog von WAMU. richtige news hab ich nicht gehört, die das rechtfertigen könnten

http://www.world-of-stocks.com/individual_values/lehmq  

jetzt schon stärkster tagesumsatz seit okt. 2010.

http://www.ariva.de/quote/...010-10-31&secu=2468&boerse_id=83  

Bei Wamu packt man die hedgefonds an den Nüssen wegen Insider-deals/Missbrauch - den Wamu-Aktionären könnte eine Beteiligung an der neuen WMI ins Händchen fallen - aber alles nur Aussagen des Anwalts...nichts wirklich handfestes...aber der Kurs macht schon mal vorauseilenden Gehorsam, warum auch nicht, ging ja lange genug runter...gibt's was neues bei den Lehmann-Schwestern - außer Schulden??

... aber die tendenz zeigt doch irgendwie in die falsche richtung, oder?

 

in Cowboyland werden sich die Aktie wohl auch noch einmal vorknüpfen.

 

 

Da glauben wohl einige, dass es in USA heute noch mal schön weiter läuft.