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Saturday, July 4, 
7:29 pm

Bear Stearns deal heightens Lehman jitters

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After the shotgun marriage of Bear Stearns and JP Morgan Sunday night, Wall Street firms - particularly Lehman which was rumored to be in similar circumstances as Bear - are taking steps to assure their access to the credit that is the life blood of the industry.

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Although Moody's Investors Service affirmed its A1 rating on the senior long-term debt of Lehman Monday morning, shares of the broker are in a pre-market free fall, poised to open down 30%, after they'd already took a 14.6% hit on Friday.

Bear Stearns was done in by at least the perception that it would be overwhelmed by the sub-prime derivatives that it specialized in; making banks like Lehman Brothers and UBS AG the next potential victims.

UBS' ability to fall back on its huge balance sheet, and large private wealth-management business, make it better able to weather a liquidity run than Bear Stearns. And Lehman's prime brokerage business is also much smaller than Bear's, suggesting that the bank isn't as vulnerable as Bear was.

Nevertheless the market is clearly jittery about Lehman's ability to weather the crisis. Reuters is reporting that the cost of protecting Lehman's debt shot up 65 basis points to 515 basis points, or $515,000 a year for five years to protect $10 million of debt, according to data from Phoenix Partners Group.

J.P. Morgan, which is protected by the Federal Reserve from blow-back on the Bear Stearns' credit default swaps, saw its swaps widen by 25 basis points to 215 basis points, according to Phoenix Partners. Investors can be expected to continue fleeing the stock ahead of its earning announcement slated for later this week. - George White





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