It’s an idea that would appeal to Dick Fuld’s famously inflated ego — but it is valid nonetheless. To assess the potential impact on the global economy of international sanctions against Vladimir Putin’s Russia, it is instructive to look back to the 2008 financial crisis and the fall of Lehman Brothers.
The treatment and behaviour of Lehman, which Fuld had led for 14 years, showed how hard it is to predict the consequences of financial interventions with systemic implications. Even if made for a moral imperative, the ramifications can be far more dire than foreseen.
On Wall Street in early September 2008, Lehman was on the brink of collapse as nervousness mounted and interbank funding dried up. Unlike many banks around the world that were bailed out by governments, Lehman infamously was allowed to fail — in part at least as retribution for past perceived misdeeds.