Before Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy in 2008 with more than $600B in debt, the Federal Reserve tried to orchestrate a private deal to save the then-fourth-largest investment bank in the US.

Track how much the US government has spent on bailouts.

Commonly referred to as the 'bank bailout,' the Troubled Asset Relief Program disbursed $443B in an attempt to keep the financial system solvent.

In March 2008, Bear Stearns was the first major bank to collapse in the Great Recession—leading to panic across the entire global financial system.

BlackRock played an integral role in the Federal Reserve's response to the Great Recession, managing about $30B of hard-to-sell Bear Stearns assets on behalf of the New York Fed.

To avoid a total collapse of the housing market, the US government took control of the two leading mortgage companies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Investment banking giant Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy in September 2008 when it had $619B in debt, making it the largest bankruptcy ever in the US

Nearly all of its 26,000 employees immediately lost their jobs. But in London, a few hundred remained tucked away, working for another decade to wind down the bank’s European business.

American Express briefly owned Lehman Brothers

In 1984, Shearson, a retail banking company and American Express subsidiary, bought the investment banking company Lehman Brothers—best known for its historic 2008 collapse—for $360M. The businesses were then called Shearson Lehman/American Express. American Express spun off Lehman Brothers with an IPO in 1994 that attracted nearly $3B in new capital.

To continue selling mortgages, agencies that determine how risky a loan is gave high ratings to homebuyers regardless of their actual risk portfolio.

‘The Giant Pool of Money’ remains one of the most acclaimed accounts of the 2008 housing bubble

This Peabody Award–winning "This American Life" episode traces how cheap global money, subprime lending, and Wall Street engineering inflated the housing bubble. Through vivid reporting and real voices, it became one of the defining works of 2000s financial journalism.

The 2008 financial system unraveled in a wave of speculation

Michael Lewis—author of the bestselling "The Big Short"—explains how a wave of speculation (among other factors) drove the 2008 collapse, from lenders issuing risky mortgages to Wall Street turning them into fragile securities. He also highlights the few outsiders who recognized the bubble and bet against it before the crash.

Sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia surged after the 2008 financial crisis.

How JPMorgan Chase became America's biggest bank

From the railroad and steel consolidations brokered by John Pierpont Morgan on Wall Street more than a century ago, to the repeal of Glass-Steagall, the financial crisis, and Jamie Dimon’s leadership, J.P. Morgan Chase has been at the center of finance for more than a century.

Passed in 2010 in the fallout of the Great Recession, the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act was the most significant financial reform since the Great Depression.

In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, the Fed began a program of quantitative easing

This program injected trillions of dollars of new money into financial markets to stimulate the economy. The move catalyzed an 11-year bull run and was repeated during the pandemic. Experts argue such power could worsen wealth inequality and contribute to bubbles in housing and finance.

Before the Great Recession, lax requirements to get a mortgage resulted in mass defaults that left nearly 19 million homes vacant.

The Federal Reserve fought the Great Recession primarily with quantitative easing and repurchasing agreements.

Pan Am was once the largest international airline in the US—but it shut down in 1991 after a series of financial issues, beginning with increased operating costs and reduced demand driven by the oil crisis in the 1970s.

BlackRock sponsored the Federal Reserve's purchasing of corporate debt through exchange-traded funds during the COVID-19 pandemic, while it simultaneously sold some of its own shares on the secondary market—sparking controversy over potentially unfair advantages.

In 2008, the 'Big Short' mastermind Michael Burry made more than $700M.

Prior to the creation of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the 1913 Pujo Committee determined that 180 people were managing more than $22B—a large slice of the entire nation's wealth—and recommended extensive regulations.

The National Housing Act established the Federal Housing Administration

During the Great Depression, 1,000 homes were foreclosed on per day, and half of the mortgages across the country defaulted. To address this crisis, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the National Housing Act. It established the Federal Housing Administration, which is still around today and helps protect lenders and buyers.

Porsche briefly made Volkswagen the most valuable company in the world in 2008

In the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis, hedge funds began placing short positions on German automaker Volkswagen. Around the same time, Porsche began acquiring a majority stake in Volkswagen, which decreased the amount of available shares, or the "stock float." Porsche then announced that it owned more than 74% of the company, prompting short sellers to realize they had placed more short positions than were logistically possible given that less than 6% of the company's shares were available to trade. In what is largely recognized as the biggest short squeeze in history, Porsche made $10B, and hedge funds lost more than $30B.

BlackRock acquired Merrill Lynch's asset management division, bringing in more than $500B in assets and pushing the firm's total assets under management above $1T in 2006.

JP Morgan Jr. once angered the nation with his zero-dollar tax bill

In the aftermath of the Great Depression, Congress learned that Morgan and his banking partners had avoided paying any federal income tax in 1931 and 1932. By claiming their losses in the stock market, they seemingly erased what they owed.

AI investment may be the next major economic bubble

A video examines the massive surge in AI spending—forecast to hit $500B by 2026—and how this may be propping up a fragile US economy. Experts warn that if AI investment slows or under-delivers, the consequences could be felt in markets, jobs and growth.

For every $100 you deposit, your bank puts a few cents in the FDIC insurance fund

This is a result of the 1933 Banking Act that established the Federal Deposit Insurance Fund. The law sought to prevent bank runs like those that decimated the banking industry amid the Great Crash and subsequent major depression. Today, individual depositors are insured up to $250K at each bank where they have an account.

The 1997 Asian financial crisis tested the limits of the rules-based order's financial architecture

When a currency crisis hit Thailand, Indonesia, and South Korea, the IMF allocated $118B in emergency loans. However, the attached conditions were widely criticized for worsening the economic downturn and increasing distrust of Western-led institutions across the Global South.

The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act—which was passed during the Great Depression with the goal of reviving domestic industry—is among the most famous pieces of economic legislation in US history.

Executives at American Online wanted to shut down AIM

Despite not seeing value in a service that could not be charged for, executives were pushed by the development team behind AOL's Instant Messenger to keep it free, which helped it reach 36 million active users. Screenname selection and away messages allowed users to express their individuality, and the use of emoticons sets the tone for future internet communication.

American Express intentionally targets wealthy cardholders, who spend higher amounts per transaction and tend to make more transactions than the average cardholder, thereby reducing the company's risk.

The Bank of America began as the Bank of Italy—one of the first US banks for the middle class—and loaned money to individuals to help rebuild after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

The 2024 Synapse collapse took $90M of people’s life savings with it

In 2024, a banking middleman called Synapse declared bankruptcy. Unfortunately, it also locked roughly 100,000 Americans out of their own money, which prompted a class action lawsuit.

Pioneered by JPMorgan, credit default swaps are a form of financial derivatives that act as insurance policies for banks issuing assets created with risky loans.

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In 2007, Bridgewater Associates, the world's largest hedge fund, warned of an impending financial crisis.

Nearly 70% of the US government’s debt is domestic

This includes intragovernmental holdings like the Social Security Trust Fund and investments from US citizens, banks, and mutual funds. About 30% is foreign-held, with countries like Japan and China as major creditors, investing in US Treasury securities due to their perceived safety.

See the 25 largest initial public offerings in US history.

These 25 companies—which include UPS, Uber Technologies, AT&T, and The Kraft Heinz Co.—had some of the biggest IPO drops in US history. However, not all these drops led to long-term (or even immediate) success.