SOME local investors of a product linked to bankrupt investment giant Lehman Brothers have received late-night phone calls from DBS Bank warning them that their entire stake may be wiped out.
The investors have their cash in a product called DBS High Notes 5 that the bank offered wealthier clients last year. It came with a promised annual return of about 5 per cent.
But Lehman's collapse on Monday means the product will be unwound and investors may only get a portion of their investment back - or none at all.
Fed chief could be saving his ammo
WASHINGTON: Despite all the turmoil in financial markets, the US Federal Reserve did not lower interest rates as expected on Tuesday. Fed chairman Ben Bernanke could be saving what's left of his ammunition in case things get nastier for the economy, say market watchers.
In a statement explaining its decision not to move rates, the US central bank did acknowledge the stomach-churning turmoil investors are already seeing, saying 'strains in financial markets have increased significantly'. But the Fed stopped short of cutting the funds rate further, which many investors on Wall Street had hoped to see as a confidence-building measure. Fed officials did not even signal that their next likely rate move would be to cut rates.
Instead, the Fed declared that the 'downside risks to growth and the upside risks to inflation are both of significant concern'. Still, that phrase at least moved the Fed away from tilting towards an increase in interest rates, which was where it had seemed to be headed.
Dick Fuld: Lehman chief who has so wisely kept his silence
By Jonathan Weil
NEW YORK: Finally, Richard Fuld got smart. He shut up.
It's been almost two whole days since Lehman Brothers filed the largest bankruptcy in US history. And there's been not a public word from The Chairman. No apologies. No regrets. No word of thanks, or even goodbye, to the thousands of employees bound to lose their jobs.
'Where's Dick?' has become a hot question. And you know what? It's the wrong one.
