Sham Transactions That Led To AIG’s Downfall: The Ugly Truth Was Hiding In Plain Sight
by ilene - January 30th, 2010 12:58 pm
Guest Post: Sham Transactions That Led To AIG’s Downfall: The Ugly Truth Was Hiding In Plain Sight
Courtesy of Tyler Durden
Submitted by David Fiderer, posted originally at Huffington Post
Sham Transactions That Led To AIG’s Downfall: The Ugly Truth Was Hiding In Plain Sight
If you want to understand the deals that wiped out AIG, the best place to start is the website of the New York Fed. In the financial statement of Maiden Lane III, published last April, we see the gory details of the three largest CDO investments – Max 2008-1, Max 2007-1, and TRIAXX 2006-2A – acquired from AIG’s banks at par. Those deals, which totaled $10.7 billion, offer a template for evaluating the other sham transactions in the portfolio.
Initially, the business deal between AIG and the banks was that AIG sold credit default swap protection. Banks buy credit default swaps for two reasons: They want to slice and their dice credit risk, and/or they want to hide something. Here’s a simple, fairly innocuous, illustration: Suppose you’re a banker who tells his client, Procter & Gamble, "We want to expand the relationship and do more business with you." P&G then says, "Fine, lend us $100 million." Back at the office, your senior credit management says, "The maximum risk exposure we approve for P&G is $80 million." How do you keep in P&G’s good graces? You lend the company $100 million, and simultaneously offload $20 million in risk exposure by purchasing a credit default swap from another bank. P&G’s understanding is that you’ve lent them $100 million.
When Deutsche Bank bought a credit default swap from AIG in 2008, its primary motivation was not to slice up the credit risk, but to hide virtually all of it. Max 2008-1, a CDO that Deutsche arranged and closed on June 25, 2008, was huge. The total debt issue was $5.8 billion, of which 94%, or the entire $5.4 billion Class A-1 tranche, was covered by one credit default swap issued by AIG Financial Products. The Class A-1 tranche was considered "supersenior" because it was ahead of two other tranches, both originally rated Aaa, which totaled $200 million. (The remaining debt $200 million worth of debt was rated Aa, a and Baa at closing.)
Put another way, Deutsche Bank did not bring Max 2008-1 to "the marketplace," where investors might consider…