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There is a lot of money to be made in bankruptcy proceedings, reports Bloomberg Businessweek, citing the ongoing dissolution of the now defunct Wall Street finance company, Lehman Brothers. Unfortunately, a lot of that cash is not going to the creditors, but rather to the lawyers cleaning up the mess of assets, toxic or otherwise, left behind after the firms collapse in 2008.
According to the Business Week post, the bankruptcy trustee, James Giddens, and his firm Hughes Hubbard & Reed earned nearly $85 million for just over a year and half’s worth of work. In addition, Alvarez & Marsal LLC, the liquidator of the parent company, has collected $262.2 million in fees almost in the same amount of time.
Knowledge of the often arcane and intricate steps of the dance known as bankruptcy law pays. In this case, the honor of working on the largest bankruptcy in history apparently has its perks, in spades, for the specialized team of lawyers necessary to manage it.
