Thursday marked the one-year anniversary of a significant milestone in Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy case: court approval of its $65 billion creditor-payment plan. But the judge's signature didn't close the book on its chapter 11 case: Lehman still winding down its holdings, settling claims and mailing checks to creditors. And Lehman will forever be tied to the recession, making it an essential case study for future business and economic students, according to an analysis in Friday's Wall Street Journal blog. The first place those students will turn will be the 2,200-page report issued in early 2010 by Anton Valukas, the court-appointed examiner given the gargantuan task of untangling the confusing web of Lehman and its many affiliates and transactions that spanned the globe. Valukas's report told the world what went wrong with Lehman and why, performing a public-service role that's not legally required but that has come to be at the heart of what bankruptcy examiners do. "It really explained how and why this happened and gave you a sense of where it was that our financial system was failing in terms of protecting investors and protecting the community," Valukas said Friday. "Once you know that, it might be of assistance in figuring out how you prevent it from happening again." To that end, Valukas's report identified what his team saw as the oversight failures of the federal government, which prompted new securities and accounting rules and regulations. He also cited the report's influence on the Dodd-Frank legislation, which he said "simply added evidence" to support financial reform.
