Lehman Brothers

The global megabank of Lehman Brothers on Wall Street filed for bankruptcy, bringing the world financial system to the brink of collapse.

In the biggest bank failure yet in US history, Washington Mutual went into receivership. Its customers had withdrawn $16.7 billion in ten days.

Only weeks after the global financial crisis precipitated by the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers and near-collapse of other US investment banks, the digital currency system Bitcoin was launched by someone using the fictitious name of...