Headline:  Yellen signals letting Lehman collapse was a mistake

American entrepreneuralism, as exemplified by innovators like Thomas Edison and Henry Ford, could not have been possible without an equally innovative, creative, engineering marvel known as America’s capital system HQ’d on the corner of Broad St. and Nassau St; home of the NYSE.

Over the decades the home of fast growing capital migrated to the multi dealer network known as NASDAQ.  Microsoft (MSFT), Apple (AAPL), Google (GOOG), raised billions fast on NASDAQ from investors all over the country and all over the world who got calls from stock brokers anxious to get shares of ‘the next big thing’ into their accounts fast, before prices doubled, or tripled and in some cases rose 1,000 or even 2,000 percent.

Starting in the 1970′s, and taking off with the bull market of the 1980′s, the home of the fast talking, street smart Wall Street broker was Lehman Brothers. Shoe shine boys became million dollar producers at Lehman. Initial Public Offerings (IPO’s) rolled out of their investment banking division in a marvelous parade of ideas brought to life with the plasma of a public offering. But Lehman is gone. Taken out back by its competitors and shot in the head when they willfully opened the trap door of credit denial.

Lehman got whacked.  Some speculate that it was Goldman Sachs who ordered the hit as a way to get some loans off their balance sheet they didn’t feel like paying back. I have no reason to believe this was not the case. Some may say, well, business is tough, ‘survival of the fittest,’ and if you can’t compete you deserve to go the way of the dodo.  In Lehman’s case we lost something special. Lehman was the goose laying the golden eggs that drove the NASDAQ to 5,000. Now it’s gone and the regulators are only beginning to figure out that it was a contract killing by the company’s enemies.  But it’s too late now, the turf war is over and the zombie, wealth-eating banks won.

The next wealth machine on the scale of Lehman, where any ‘Joe the Plumber’ could walk in off the street and make a million bucks, will probably pop up in Asia somewhere.  Lehman Bros. RIP