At 9 a.m. on the 13th, Wall Street's Lehman Brothers Investment Company held a special press conference to expose the falsification of the third-quarter earnings statements of the capital bank led by Citigroup, as well as the falsification of the company's internal loss data, and deceived investors to achieve ulterior purposes. Pen Fun Pavilion www.biquge.info And now, behind me, Citigroup spokesman Hughes is answering reporters' questions one by one on the above questions. The Washington Post reporter made a quick introduction in front of the camera.

She is now located at Citigroup's headquarters in the heart of Manhattan, with Citi's distinctive red umbrella logo hanging at the top of the screen.

At this time, the hall was crowded with nearly 400 well-known media from all over the world, just for this big event that could change the entire American financial industry, and there was nothing more eye-catching than Citigroup being caught in a scandal and possibly even going bankrupt.

"Mr. Sandywell is out. ”

With an exclamation, almost all the reporters frantically rushed towards an entrance, and out came a large number of Citigroup executives led by Sandywell.

"Mr. President, could you please give your opinion on the data released by Lehman Brothers, are they telling the truth?" the New York Times reporter squeezed to the front desperately, trying to reach out for his microphone.

Not to be outdone, the Los Angeles Times reporter handed over a long gun and a short gun, with a great sense of not asking what to do, "Mr. Sandywell, Mr. Richard Folder, President of Lehman Brothers, has reportedly filed a lawsuit with the Federal Court and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation against you for alleged violations of the Banking Transactions Act and the Anti-Money Laundering Act. And accusing Lehman Brothers of violating your contract to extract nearly $40 billion in Canadian bonds from Lehman Brothers when the company was in trouble, what do you have to say about that?"

With a smile on his face, Sandwell didn't say anything about it the whole time, and he made it to the news station with the help of bodyguards and company staff.

After a moment of discussion with Hughes, the company's press spokesperson, he decisively pressed the headset and coughed to silence everyone's voices, "Good morning, gentlemen and ladies!"

"I will now publish a statement from Citigroup to Lehman Brothers: We will uphold the God-given principle of freedom and fairness, and openly face all unfounded accusations under the supervision of law and justice. All the problems caused by Lehman Brothers' own mismanagement have nothing to do with Citigroup. Mr. Richard Fored should face up to his situation and speak cautiously...... Citigroup is operating without any problems, and our performance is growing at a high rate every month. Citigroup will immediately initiate a counter-lawsuit against Lehman Brothers and Mr. Richard Fored himself, and demand that Mr. Richard Fored immediately apologize and compensate for the above false statements. ”

After spilling over a lot of useless nonsense, Sandywell was at a loss because he found that the reporters below didn't care about the tearing up between Citigroup and Lehman Brothers, because it wasn't everyone's focus right now.

Sure enough, in the free questioning stage, one sharp question after another was thrown up.

"Mr. Sandywell, what do you think about Citigroup's stock price falling by $8 in 50 minutes, and will Citigroup come up with effective measures to prevent the stock price from continuing to fall?"

Sandywell was prepared for this, and confidently said, "The difficulties are only temporary! We attach great importance to the problem of abnormal fluctuations in the stock market, and before coming here, I have reached a bailout agreement with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and Citigroup and the Federal Reserve will invest $50 billion in the stock market in the next 7 to 15 days to ensure that the normal rights and interests of investors are not infringed." ”

"So what do you have to say to depositors around the world? According to the tracking reports of major media outlets around the world, in the past 50 minutes, more than 200,000 people have poured into Citi's major business outlets and started to withdraw their deposits in a frenzy. I would like to ask, does Citi have enough reserves to weather the run?"

Sandywell calmly replied, "None of this is a problem. What Citi has been subjected to is nothing more than groundless and illogical accusations, a malicious smear by its competitors who want to take advantage of it to make a profit, which is shameful. We will conduct a thorough investigation of the entire incident. We appeal to all depositors that Citigroup's credit is built on our commitment to banking for more than 100 years, and we have not had any problems before, now and in the future, because we are the best bank in the world, and we have this confidence. Today, Citi has total assets of more than $1.2 trillion and ranks among the top 50 in the world in terms of net assets, and we have 12 million of our most loyal customers and more than 50 million small and medium-sized investors.

After all, the dead camel is bigger than the horse, and the credit that Citi has accumulated over the years, combined with Sandywell's words, is enough to affect a large number of Citigroup's loyal users, after all, the global financial market is now in turmoil, and no one knows which bank is safer.

"Mr. Sandywell, what do you think of Lehman Brothers' accusations of embezzlement and anti-money laundering? But why is it that this transaction was disclosed less than half a month ago?"

"It's easy!" said Sandywell, looking a little ugly, but still holding on, "because it's very beneficial for both parties." Lehman Brothers' companies pledged a portion of their outstanding bonds to Citigroup for working capital, and our company believes that this transaction is in line with the company's normal business after the most professional analysis. So we made a loan to Lehman Brothers. ”

Every question seemed to be answered without flaws, but the evidence in the hands of the reporters was more than that, and after calmly coping with it, a reporter with a Wall Street Financial Journal credential got up.

She first looked around, looking at her peers with a look of disdain, then releasing her aura like a proud peacock, and after a moment of deliberation, she slowly asked, "Mr. Sandywell, can you answer my question?"

Sandywell looked at her, seemed to think it wasn't a big deal, and made a gesture of please.

The latter smiled slightly, and under everyone's gaze, she took out a document from her handbag, and after opening the most crucial page for everyone to see, she said, "Since Citigroup believes that all of its operations are legal, can I ask if your company's exchange of $46 billion in assets with a par value of $40 billion for Lehman Brothers' company plus bonds has been reviewed by the US Federal Securities and Exchange Commission?" Why is Lehman Brothers unable to come up with even $100 million to redeem its debts after receiving the so-called $40 billion loan from your company? Can Mr. Sandwell give me an answer to any of these?"

"First of all, as for the replacement of the plus bonds, I would like to say that this is due to trade secrets, and I cannot disclose the details of it. I would like to reiterate once that there are pros and cons to any transaction, and we only completed the above transaction out of consideration of our own legitimate interests. As for the second item, then I have to ask these ladies to ask Mr. Richard Forder for themselves, after all, I am not the chairman of Lehman Brothers, and I cannot know exactly every detail of Lehman Brothers' internal operations, perhaps they have lost too much money in this financial turmoil, and some debts have even been hidden from the public, and they may not be made public. Sandywell knew that the other party might be deliberately trying to cause trouble, but he couldn't avoid answering this question, otherwise it would be obvious that the inside story would be caught in the coffin.

Citigroup needs time to adjust its strategy and contact allies to smooth out its losses in the financial market and stabilize its stock price, followed by the scale and object of the US government's bailout.

It's an ironic joke, because Citigroup was one of the first rounds of funding that the Fed and the U.S. Treasury discussed, which means that the situation has changed drastically, and the company that was supposed to pay for it has become the one that needs to be rescued, and it is the one that needs to be rescued the most.

"So do you have any explanation for whether or not there was fraud in the third-quarter earnings report?" The reporter for the Wall Street Financial Journal is not a reporter for Rockefeller, and certainly does not take Citigroup seriously.

Citigroup is a responsible company, and our corporate statements are released after a joint calculation by seven of the most professional financial and accounting firms in the United States, and are audited by the most authoritative audit by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the federal financial and insurance industry. Every step is counted back and forth by dozens of authoritative figures. So I think you'd better take a look at their qualifications and talk to me about that. Sandywell never dared to answer that question head-on, because he knew best what was going on in the third-quarter report.

If the unspoken rule within the industry in the past was to modify the statements within 10%, then now, Citigroup has almost done 100% data tampering, which is destined to be unavoidable to be investigated by interested people, but for Citigroup, a financial company with annual revenue of more than $400 billion and a net profit of up to $50 billion.

It has more than 20,000 business locations, subsidiary offices and partners around the world. The easiest and most straightforward way to investigate whether such a company's earnings statements were fraudulent was to investigate the accounting law firms that worked for him and go directly to Citi's headquarters to search.

But this is almost impossible, because Citi's influence is enough to discourage anyone with bad intentions, and with their connections in Congress and federal departments, no one can get first-hand information.

Therefore, it can only be counted through its commercial outlets around the world to calculate Citi's total operating income and loss amount one by one.

This is a desperate project, and even if the US business department and Congressional financial watchdog broke through layers of pressure to launch a final review of Citigroup and set up an unprecedentedly large investigation team, it would have taken a year or two to get to the bottom of the investigation.

It's just that at that point, Citi won't be afraid of anything at all, because investors won't care about Citi's past, but will focus on Citi's future, and as long as there is money to be made, they don't care what tricks you played in the past.

For every seemingly sharp problem, Sandywell had a corresponding excuse to deal with, but in the end he could not come up with the most favorable rescue plan to restore the gradually lost confidence of investors, and even in the middle of the press conference, an even more shocking news came.

"Citigroup's share price has fallen from $28.85 to $25.77 before the press conference, and has gradually begun to fall below the psychological level of $25, and if Citigroup does not take strong measures, then by today's close, Citigroup's stock price may even fall below $20. ”

The news was instantly passed back and forth throughout the hall, and everyone had panicked fear on their faces, because the situation had gotten out of control, and more serious consequences had appeared.

In addition, according to statistics from the financial industry, companies related to financial banks were dragged down by Citi's stock price, and fell by 8 percent in just over an hour, and the entire U.S. stock market evaporated $450 billion in the past hour. ”

"I'm sorry, I have urgent business to deal with, and I would like to ask Mr. Adams, Senior Executive Vice President, to answer your questions. Sandywell couldn't sit still, not only because he was upset by the company's stock price, but also because of the financial institutions that were being dragged down by Citi.

They have banded together to put pressure on Citigroup, and now they must do something to save their interests.

"Immediately notify the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury that we need to bail out the market in advance, and if Citigroup collapses at this time, then there will be a financial tsunami for the entire U.S. financial industry. Remember, the financial crisis is already escalating, and if they don't want the financial industry to collapse completely, then approve Citigroup's bailout immediately. "Sandywell knew things had reached a point of no return. Now, it's time for the U.S. federal bailout of Citi!