Refco files for 4th-largest bankruptcy in history

• Refco Inc., the futures broker under investigation after its chief executive allegedly hid a $430-million debt, has filed for court protection from creditors in the fourth-largest U.S. bankruptcy.
• Shares of Refco plunged yesterday, wiping out about $924 million in market value, after the company asked a U.S. bankruptcy court in Manhattan late Monday for permission to reorganize its $48.6 billion in liabilities.
• Refco's bankruptcy filing comes 10 weeks after it sold shares to the public for the first time, and it may set up a contest between the Flowers group and the government of Dubai, whose offers to purchase the whole company have been rebuffed.
• "It's a mess, an absolute mess," said Kevin Starke, who covers distressed and recently bankrupt companies for Weeden & Co. in Greenwich, Conn.
• Refco listed assets of $48.8 billion, including the parent company and 23 of its units.
• The company's 127.5 million shares, which were delisted from the New York Stock Exchange, resumed trading under the symbol RFXCQ and fell $7.25 to 65 cents in over-the-counter trading yesterday.
• Refco's filing under Chapter 11 of the bankruptcy code surpasses Delta Air Lines Inc.'s $21.6-billion filing in September, making it the biggest this year, and trails Conseco Inc.'s $52-billion filing in December 2002, the third-largest ever.
• Refco's filing dwarfs that of Drexel Burnham Lambert Group Inc., the brokerage that declared assets of $3.7 billion when it filed for bankruptcy in February 1990, according to an Associated Press report at the time.
• The government of Dubai was part of a group that bid $1billion for all of Refco and was rejected, according to Carlos Abadi, who runs Abadi & Co., a New York investment bank.
• Should either Flowers or the Dubai group acquire title to Refco assets through a bankruptcy auction, ownership would be free and clear of any liens or claims by creditors or shareholders.