The Enron Illusion

Today In History with The Retrospectors

Enron—the seventh-largest company in the U.S.—filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on 2nd December, 2001, marking the dramatic end of a business empire once hailed as unstoppable.

What once looked like a financial juggernaut turned out to be a house of cards built on illusory profits, market manipulation, and sheer audacity. “Creative” accounting, including mark-to-market practices, had inflated their profits by booking future revenues as current earnings.

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly explain how Enron emerged from a gas trading company to a dodgy corporate monolith; uncover the shady partnerships run by CFO Andrew Fastow; and reveal exactly what went wrong with the company’s beleaguered Indian power plant project…

Further Reading:

• ‘The collapse of Enron and the dark side of business’ (BBC News, 2021): https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58026162

• ’Former Enron CFO Andrew Fastow: ‘You can follow all the rules and still commit fraud’’ (The Irish Times, 2016):

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/companies/former-enron-cfo-andrew-fastow-you-can-follow-all-the-rules-and-still-commit-fraud-1.2485821

• ‘Collapse of Enron (2001) | A Day That Shook the World’ (British Pathé, 2018):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Z9Z2i3qfiw

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