The Biggest Corporate Bankruptcies in History

1. 1

   Lehman Brothers Holdings

   Still the largest Chapter 11 filing in US history.

   $639B

   filed Sept 2008

2. 2

   Washington Mutual

   The largest bank failure in US history.

   $327.9B

   filed Sept 2008

3. 3

   WorldCom

   Followed roughly $11B in accounting fraud.

   $103.9B

   filed July 2002

4. 4

   General Motors

   $91B

   filed June 2009

5. 5

   CIT Group

   $80.4B

   filed Nov 2009

6. 6

   PG&E Corp

   $51.7B of its liabilities came from California wildfire damages.

   $71.4B

   filed Jan 2019

7. 7

   Enron

   $65.5B

   filed Dec 2001

8. 8

   Conseco

   $61.4B

   filed Dec 2002

Lehman’s asset figure is sometimes cited as high as $691B in secondary sources — $639B (from its own SEC filing roughly three months before collapse) is the more consistently corroborated number.