Tuesday, Sep. 16, 2008

Thornburg Mortgage

2009

$36.5 billion in assets

Thornburg Mortgage declared bankruptcy after struggling to find investors to fund its core business: providing expensive mortgage loans to well-credited buyers. With home sales down dramatically and defaults on the rise, the value of the company's mortgages fell; after a $1.35 billion bailout from private investors failed to stop the collapse, the company was forced into Chapter 11 on May 1, 2009. Thornburg had previously estimated a loss of $2.75 billion during the first three quarters of 2008.