Warnings from the Enron Message Board
36 Pages Posted: 25 Jul 2006
Abstract
As Enron collapsed in the Summer and Fall of 2001, most Wall Street analysts maintained either buy or strong buy recommendations for Enron common stock. The largest bankruptcy in U.S. history was often described as coming without warning, as $60 billion in market capitalization vanished. We searched postings on the Yahoo! Enron Message Board between 1997 and 2001 for warnings of a crash to come. We found a compelling four-year history of Enron as told by apparent insiders through anonymous posts. Excerpts of 129 posts from Enron's Yahoo! message board, describing a disturbing corporate culture at Enron, include repeated warnings to investors to get out while they can.
Keywords: Enron, message board, scandal, inside information, governance
JEL Classification: D82, G11, G14, G24, G38, M52
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
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