NEW YORK — Lehman Brothers said Monday it would report its first-ever quarterly loss and raise $6 billion in additional capital, signaling that the turmoil in the credit market is far from over.
After weeks of heightened speculation about the financial strength of Wall Street’s fourth-largest firm, Lehman preannounced its second- quarter results Monday morning. It is expecting a net loss of $2.8 billion, or $5.14 per share, for the quarter that ended May 31, compared with profits of $1.3 billion, or $2.21 per share, a year ago.
The results far exceeded analysts’ estimates of several hundred million dollars in losses.
The losses came as the firm wrote down the value of assets on its books. Lehman also lost money from its trading activities. In addition, the firm suffered hits as its hedges, or steps taken to protect the firm from certain losses, failed to work.
Since the credit crisis began nearly a year ago, Lehman Brothers had been one of the Wall Street firms that had been posting relatively decent quarterly results.
