brothers moved from germany to the united states in the eight hundred forty s. setting up a dry goods store by the following decade they devolved into a commodities trading house at the point it collapsed it was the fourth largest investment bank in the us financial institutions a complex web of operations and a lot of people don t really understand the products they sell in fact they often lie on that products like the week real estate loans they packaged into securities and sold around the world as housing prices began to fall and mortgages of overindebted homeowners became wifeless a chain reaction was set in motion. the u.s. federal reserve system the fed in new york high ranking representatives from the banking industry are tasked with keeping lehman brothers afloat the u.s. secretary of the treasury has made it clear that the u.s. government more paying a cent he thinks one of the banks at the meeting should take over the ailing