AREA 42 // CATEGORY INDEX
Finance & corporate power
Banking, markets, corporate conduct, financial crises and economic allegations.
72 of 72 dossiers are indexed. Each entry evaluates a specific claim, documented plot, or alleged cover-up; unresolved events are not treated as proof.
The air cargo fuel-surcharge cartel
ASSESSMENT: Specific cargo surcharge coordination was proven by authorities; broad claims about all airline pricing do not follow.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 002Argentina’s 2001 default and collapse of the currency board
ASSESSMENT: Policy errors and severe social costs are well documented; a deliberate plan to impoverish Argentina is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 003Johns-Manville, asbestos knowledge and worker exposure
ASSESSMENT: Serious occupational hazards and concealment by parts of the industry are documented; claims should identify company, period and specific exposure.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 004The Asian financial crisis and IMF conditionality
ASSESSMENT: Program design warrants criticism, but interacting domestic fragility, capital flows and external shocks explain the crisis better than a single plot.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 005AT&T’s antitrust case and the 1984 divestiture
ASSESSMENT: A serious exclusion case produced a structural remedy; the effect of breakup should be stated with service-specific evidence.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 006Barings Bank and Nick Leeson’s unauthorized positions
ASSESSMENT: Unauthorized positions and supervisory failures are established; a deliberate external attack is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 007BCCI: cross-border banking fraud and regulatory blind spots
ASSESSMENT: Concealed control and fraud are strongly documented; sweeping claims about every political connection are not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 008Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme and missed warnings
ASSESSMENT: Fraud and oversight failure are conclusively established; an official protection conspiracy is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 009The 1987 stock-market crash and portfolio insurance
ASSESSMENT: Feedback trading and market design failures contributed; deliberate orchestration is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 010Continental Illinois and the 1984 too-big-to-fail intervention
ASSESSMENT: The rescue and policy consequences are documented; a secret bank-government pact is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 011De Beers and the historical diamond supply system
ASSESSMENT: A powerful historical supply system is documented; current all-market control is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 012Enron’s accounting fraud and complex energy trading
ASSESSMENT: Senior-executive reporting fraud is firmly established; claims that every market movement was an Enron conspiracy are not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 013Foreign-exchange benchmark coordination and chatrooms
ASSESSMENT: Specific collusion and misuse of client information are established, not a centrally rigged global FX market.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 014Glass–Steagall and the separation of banking activities
ASSESSMENT: The 1933 law addressed real conflicts; the single-cause repeal narrative is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 015Federal Reserve policy and the 1930–33 bank panics
ASSESSMENT: Severe policy failure is well supported; intentional destruction of the banking system is unsubstantiated.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 016Greece’s fiscal reporting failures and sovereign-debt crisis
ASSESSMENT: Serious reporting failures are documented; the crisis’s full cause was broader than one falsified statistic.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 017The Hunt brothers’ attempted silver corner
ASSESSMENT: Concentrated speculative activity and market disruption are well documented; total control of silver prices is an exaggeration.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 018Iceland’s banking collapse and the 2008 emergency response
ASSESSMENT: Domestic bank governance and supervision failures are established; a coordinated foreign attack is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 019Japan’s late-1980s asset bubble and monetary policy
ASSESSMENT: The bubble, tightening and slow cleanup are documented; intentional destruction or foreign orchestration is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 020JPMorgan’s London Whale synthetic-credit losses
ASSESSMENT: Control and disclosure failures are established; a deliberate plan to rig credit markets is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 021The LCD panel price-fixing cartel
ASSESSMENT: Supplier price coordination was established; precise consumer overcharges require careful market-specific estimation.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 022Lehman Brothers’ Repo 105 balance-sheet reporting
ASSESSMENT: Window dressing is documented; the claim that it alone caused Lehman’s bankruptcy is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 023LIBOR submissions and documented rate manipulation
ASSESSMENT: Named traders and banks manipulated rates; a universal, timeless LIBOR conspiracy is not established.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 024The global lysine price-fixing cartel
ASSESSMENT: A specific international price-fixing conspiracy was proven in court; claims beyond the participants and period require new evidence.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 025Mexico’s 1994–95 peso crisis and reserve disclosure
ASSESSMENT: Reserve vulnerability and policy missteps are documented; an externally coordinated attack is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 026MF Global and missing customer segregated funds
ASSESSMENT: Customer-fund deficiencies and controls failures are documented; individual intent requires legal distinctions.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 027United States v. Microsoft and browser tying
ASSESSMENT: Exclusionary conduct was legally established in specific practices; universal claims of technology suppression exceed the judgment.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 028John Law’s Mississippi Company and France’s debt crisis
ASSESSMENT: Expansion and collapse are documented; a wholly knowing confidence trick is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 029Municipal investment agreements and bid-rigging
ASSESSMENT: Collusion occurred in identified programs; extrapolation to all municipal finance is unwarranted.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 030The 1971 suspension of dollar-gold convertibility
ASSESSMENT: The policy break and distributional effects are documented; a secret seizure of financial assets is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 031The 1973 Arab oil embargo and the oil-price shock
ASSESSMENT: Political embargo and coordinated producer leverage are documented; claims that one secret group controlled every oil price are not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 032The Panic of 1907 and private financial rescue
ASSESSMENT: Private rescue power and systemic fragility are established; deliberate manufacture of the panic is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 033Parmalat’s fabricated cash and hidden debt
ASSESSMENT: Fabricated cash and hidden debt were established; responsibility beyond convicted insiders requires transaction-specific proof.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 034Purdue Pharma opioid marketing and OxyContin claims
ASSESSMENT: Misbranding and deceptive practices were admitted in defined cases; attributing the entire opioid epidemic to one company is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 035Salomon Brothers’ Treasury auction violations
ASSESSMENT: False customer bids and limit evasion are established; broader impact and senior knowledge remain bounded questions.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 036The savings-and-loan crisis and regulatory forbearance
ASSESSMENT: Regulatory delay and specific fraud worsened the crisis; a single organized scheme to transfer all losses is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 037The South Sea Bubble and the 1720 debt conversion
ASSESSMENT: Political favoritism and insider abuse are strongly evidenced; a unified plot explaining the whole bubble is not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 038Standard Oil and the 1911 antitrust dissolution
ASSESSMENT: Unlawful monopolization was legally established; sweeping present-day lineage claims need separate evidence.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 039Sterling’s 1992 exit from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism
ASSESSMENT: The ERM commitment became unsustainable; one speculator’s secret control is unproven.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 040Credit-rating conflicts in the mortgage securities boom
ASSESSMENT: Conflicts and severe analytical failures are documented; deliberate fraud must be proved rating by rating.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 041Sugar industry funding and the 1960s heart-disease review
ASSESSMENT: Undisclosed industry influence on one review is documented; claims of total control over nutrition science overstate the record.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 042Sumitomo’s copper trading scandal and market control claims
ASSESSMENT: Major unauthorized trading and market abuse are documented; board-wide foreknowledge and total price control are not.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 043Sweden’s early-1990s banking crisis and guarantee
ASSESSMENT: Deregulation and property lending helped cause crisis; the state intervention protected system functions while imposing equity losses.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 044TARP bank rescues and the 2008 bailout design
ASSESSMENT: A consequential rescue with documented accountability failures occurred; the claim that all funds were simply given away is false.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 045Tobacco companies’ knowledge of smoking risks and public claims
ASSESSMENT: A prolonged campaign of deceptive public statements was legally established; attribution should remain tied to company, period and finding.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 046The vitamins price-fixing cartel
ASSESSMENT: Multiple vitamin cartels were legally established; extending findings to all supplement markets is unwarranted.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 047The Federal Reserve’s 1979–82 disinflation
ASSESSMENT: Intentional anti-inflation tightening and its costs are clear; a covert corporate-control purpose is not demonstrated.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 048Volkswagen diesel emissions defeat-device scandal
ASSESSMENT: Use of defeat devices in identified diesel vehicles is conclusively documented; scope and individual knowledge must be bounded by evidence.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 049Wells Fargo unauthorized accounts and sales targets
ASSESSMENT: Unauthorized openings and management-control failures are established; individual knowledge and harm need account-specific evidence.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 050WorldCom’s capitalization of network line costs
ASSESSMENT: The specific capitalization fraud is proven; industry-wide coordination is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 051Toshiba’s profit inflation and accounting scandal
ASSESSMENT: Systematic improper, target-driven accounting is documented; former executives were not criminally convicted, and not every estimate was fraudulent.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 052Wirecard’s €1.9 billion cash shortfall and collapse
ASSESSMENT: Large-scale fraud is strongly supported, but individual roles and regulatory culpability must track adjudicated facts.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 053Theranos blood-testing claims and investor fraud
ASSESSMENT: Investor fraud was established on specified counts; jury outcomes do not prove every Theranos claim or criminal patient harm.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 054FTX customer assets, Alameda and Sam Bankman-Fried
ASSESSMENT: Customer assets were misused and Bankman-Fried’s specified fraud convictions stand; avoid generalizing to every employee or creditor.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 0551MDB, bond proceeds and Goldman Sachs
ASSESSMENT: Diversion and bribery tied to specified offerings are established; findings do not implicate all Goldman staff or Malaysian officials.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 056Siemens’ global bribery scheme and compliance failures
ASSESSMENT: Systemic bribery-related accounting/control failures are admitted; blanket guilt for all projects and staff is not supported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 057Airbus intermediaries and global bribery resolution
ASSESSMENT: Serious intermediary and disclosure failures established within resolution scope; Airbus was not U.S.-jury convicted and not every payment was corrupt.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 058Satyam Computer Services’ fabricated accounts
ASSESSMENT: Core falsification is strongly documented; individual guilt should track named court findings.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 059Adelphia hidden debt and Rigas-family control
ASSESSMENT: John and Timothy Rigas were convicted on specified counts; guilt does not extend automatically to all relatives or employees.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 060Tyco executive compensation, loans and disclosures
ASSESSMENT: Kozlowski and Swartz were convicted of specified offenses; not every Tyco payment or practice was criminal.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 061HealthSouth earnings manipulation and Richard Scrushy’s acquittal
ASSESSMENT: HealthSouth fraud is documented; Scrushy was acquitted of federal accounting charges. Saying he was convicted of that fraud is false.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 062AIG finite-reinsurance transactions and accounting controls
ASSESSMENT: AIG control failures are documented; Greenberg was not criminally convicted. Respect acquittal and settlement terms.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 063Countrywide mortgages, securitization and investor claims
ASSESSMENT: Civil evidence supports misrepresentation in identified securities, not fraud in every mortgage or participation in a single crisis plot.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 064HSBC AML failures and sanctions violations
ASSESSMENT: Serious institutional control failures and specified sanctions conduct are established; universal criminality of HSBC transactions is unsupported.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 065Standard Chartered Iran sanctions transactions and compliance
ASSESSMENT: Repeated sanctions violations are established within specified entities and transactions; no broad geopolitical conspiracy is shown.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 066Olympus hidden investment losses and accounting cover-up
ASSESSMENT: Concealment and named convictions are documented; not every fee or board member is shown to be knowingly fraudulent.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 067SAC Capital insider trading and firm liability
ASSESSMENT: Several insider-trading cases and firm plea are established; not every employee or position was illegal.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 068Galleon, Raj Rajaratnam and confidential tips
ASSESSMENT: Specified insider-trading convictions stand; universal hedge-fund collusion is not established.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 069Luckin Coffee fabricated sales and U.S. listing
ASSESSMENT: Fabricated sales are strongly documented; exact losses and each executive’s role remain specific questions.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 070Martha Stewart: insider-trading claim versus actual convictions
ASSESSMENT: Claim she was criminally convicted of insider trading is false; she was convicted of process crimes and acquitted of securities fraud.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 071Apple, Ireland and the overturned EU state-aid decision
ASSESSMENT: The final EU ruling reinstated selective state-aid finding. Calling this criminal fraud or treating 2020 annulment as final misstates record.
READ THE DOSSIER →DOSSIER // 072The Secret 1910 Jekyll Island Meeting and the Creation of the Federal Reserve
ASSESSMENT: a secret 1910 meeting of bankers at Jekyll Island did draft the plan that became the Federal Reserve Act; claims it was created solely to enrich a banking cartel omit the public legislative process that followed.
READ THE DOSSIER →