With General Motors's fall into bankruptcy on Monday, the current economic crisis has accounted for five out of the ten biggest ever bankruptcies in the US.
Making the current crisis even worse, the five new entrants to this dubious league account for more than 80 per cent of the top ten in terms of the asset size of the bankrupt companies.
The five bankruptcies in the current economic crisis together account for assets worth about 1.2 trillion dollars, against about 250 billion dollars of the remaining five.
General Motors itself has become the fourth biggest ever bankruptcy candidate in the US, next only to those of Lehman Brothers, Washington Mutual and WorldCom.
Lehman Brothers and WaMu also went belly-up in the current economic crisis itself, while that of once iconic telecom brand WorldCom happened in 2002.
Another auto giant Chrysler fell into bankruptcy about a month ago and is the seventh biggest so far in the US history. Energy giant Enron in 2001 and insurance and finance major Conseco in 2002 are the fifth and sixth biggest ever bankruptcies respectively so far.
Others in top-ten bankruptcy list include residential mortgage lender Thornburg Mortgage Inc (eigth), electricity and natural gas firm Pacific Gas and Electric Company (ninth) and petroleum major Texaco (tenth).
1. Lehman Brothers - investment banking (2008)
2. Washington Mutual - savings and loan holding (2008)
3.WorldCom - telecom (2002)
4. General Motors - auto (2009)
5. Enron- energy (2001)
6. Conseco - insurance and finance (2002)
7.Chrysler - auto (2009)
8.Thornburg Mortgage Inc - residential mortgage lender (2009)
9. Pacific Gas and Electric Company - electricity and natural gas (2001)
10.Texaco - petroleum major (1987)
