What Historians Get Wrong About the 2008 Crash — It Wasn't the Banks That Broke First

The popular story of the 2008 financial crisis begins with Lehman Brothers collapsing in September. But the historical record reveals a fundamentally different timeline. Seventeen months before Lehman failed, a subprime mortgage originator named New Century Financial collapsed in near-total silence. On the exact same day, Europe's largest bank, HSBC, issued its first-ever profit warning over billions in bad subprime debt. The true origins of the crash didn't start with Wall Street depository banks; they started with unregulated nonbank lenders who originated the overwhelming majority of high-risk loans. This documentary traces the actual sequence of the 2008 collapse—from the early 2007 warning signs the market ignored to the compromised ratings agencies and the government's controversial decision to rescue Bear Stearns, which set the trap for the catastrophe that followed. 🕒 Chapters 0:00 - The Lehman Brothers Myth 1:00 - New Century Financial: The Real First Domino 2:20 - April 2007: When HSBC & New Century Cracked 3:43 - How Nonbank Lenders Built the Bubble 7:00 - The Truth About Credit Rating Agencies (S&P, Moody's, Fitch) 8:25 - The Slow Bleed of 2007 (Bear Stearns & BNP Paribas) 9:15 - The Bear Stearns Rescue: The Decision That Set the Trap 10:00 - The Weekend Lehman Brothers Died #2008Crash #FinancialCrisis #LehmanBrothers #EconomicHistory #WallStreet #SubprimeCrisis #history #wealthXcape