Lehman Brothers Holdings
Assets: $691 billion
This is one list no company would have liked to top. But we do have a winner and it is none other that the epicenter of the worst financial crisis since the Great depression, Lehman Brothers. One of the most highly regarded and most envied Wall Street firm Lehman Brothers Holdings was forced to file for bankruptcy protection last September, the largest corporate filing in the history of U.S. Its effect was devastating sending shockwaves which brought the whole world economy to its knees. Just to put things into perspective, Dow Jones closed down just over 500 points on September 15, 2008, at the time the largest drop by points in a single day since the days following the attacks on September 11, 2001.

Washington Mutual
Assets: $327.9 billion
One of the biggest victims of the sub prime crisis WaMu, the 119-year-old Seattle-based thrift, sought Chapter 11 protection in U.S. Bankruptcy Court. Panic stricken customers of Washington Mutual withdrew more than $16 billion of deposits over a 10-day period .It forced the government to seize the holding company's banking assets and sell them to JPMorgan Chase for $1.9 billion. Washington Mutual had fallen 98 percent over the past year on losses tied to sub prime lending. Washington Mutual Chairman and CEO Kerry Kiplinger had pledged in 2003 "We hope to do to this industry what Wal-Mart did to theirs, Starbucks did to theirs, Costco did to theirs and Lowe's-Home Depot did to their industry. And I think if we’ve done our job, five years from now you’re not going to call us a bank." At least he was partially correct five years down no one call WaMu a bank, they call it a disaster.

WorldCom
Assets: $103.9 billion
It was an accounting scandal which made headlines all over the world. WorldCom was once the second-largest long-distance telecom in the U.S. after AT&T, WorldCom filed for bankruptcy protection. It was due to the discovery of an $11 billion accounting scandal. CEO Bernard Ebbers sentenced to 25 years in prison and several other WorldCom executives subsequently pleaded guilty to fraud charges. The company emerged from bankruptcy in 2004 as MCI Inc. At that time it was the biggest bankruptcy filing. Under the bankruptcy reorganization agreement, the company paid $750 million to the SEC in cash and stock in the new MCI. On February 14, 2005, Verizon Communications agreed to acquire MCI for $7.6 billion.

General Motors
Assets: $91 billion
General Motors bankruptcy marked an end of an era. Once the pride of US automotive superiority and symbol of excellence, GM ranks as the largest industrial company seek bankruptcy protection in the history of American business. It was long coming as the company has been bleeding for a while largely due to inability to change. When it filed for Chapter 11, the company announced it owed $172 billion to creditors.” Our agreement with the U.S. Treasury and the governments of Canada and Ontario will create a leaner, quicker more customer and completely product-focused company, one that’s more cost competitive and has a competitive balance sheet,” CEO Fritz Henderson said at a news conference in New York. “This new GM will be built from the strongest parts of our business, including our best brands and products.”

Enron
Assets: $65.5 billion
In 2001 Enron, the nation's largest energy, electricity and natural gas company was devastated by massive accounting scandal. As the scandal unraveled, company was instantly devalued and thousands of employees were laid off. Enron shares dropped from over US$90.00 to just pennies. Executives Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were both convicted of fraud. In addition the scandal brought down accounting firm Arthur Andersen, at that time one of the biggest name in the industry. The Enron scandal is considered a landmark case because it inspired the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, which set new standards and practices for public companies.

Conseco
Assets: $61 billion
The company fell as it accrued massive debt of more than $8 billion and was forced to file for bankruptcy in December 2002.Poor management was largely responsible for bringing down this Indiana-based finance and insurance company. It shares once traded as high as $58, but they were worth less than $1 when the firm declared bankruptcy. Conseco emerged from bankruptcy in 2003.It now sells life insurance and health insurance to more than 4 million customers.

Chrysler
Assets: $39 billion
One of the high flying Detroit auto giant, Chrysler like its peer GM could not survive the financial crisis. As a part of bankruptcy reorganization Chrysler formed an alliance with the Italian car maker Fiat. Chrysler was held by private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management after it was sold by German carmaker Daimler-Benz. The United Auto Workers (UAW) will take control of the company via its retirement plan and the U.S. government is expected to inject a total of $12 billion into the company. The part of the reorganization is lower labor cost and less debt.

Thornburg Mortgage
Assets: $36.5 billion
The sub prime financial crisis brought down Thornburg Mortgage. Thornburg Mortgage Inc. headquartered in Santa Fe, New Mexico was founded in 1993 by Garrett Thornburg & Larry A. Goldstone. This mega mortgage lender was hit really hard by the crisis resulting in massive erosion in its stock prices. It tried to raise more equity to prevent it self from crashing. After $1.35 billion bailout from private investors failed to stop the collapse, Thornburg Mortgage was left with no option. It announced that it would shut shop and sell any remaining assets.

Pacific Gas and Electric Co
Assets: $36 billion
Pacific Gas and Electric Co. (PG&E) was forced to enter Chapter 11 bankruptcy April 6, 2001. The deregulation of energy markets in California in 2000-2001 resulted in a crisis which saw PG&E filling for bankruptcy .Because of very limited power generating capacity and very high cost, company was forced o file for Chapter 11. California governor Gray Davis bailed out the utility firm, provoking a controversy which played an important part in the eventual recall. PG&E emerged from bankruptcy in April 2004, after distributing $10.2 billion to hundreds of creditors. Today it has around 4.8 million electricity customers.

Texaco
Assets: $34.9 billion
A merger battle over Getty Oil in 1984 went sour Texaco. Pennzoil sued Texaco for disrupting an already completed deal. It was awarded $10 billion. The verdict was later reduced to $1 billion, but in 1987 a Supreme Court ruling later upheld the original finding. This verdict was a death blow to Texaco which was unable to make payment to Pennzoil and filed for bankruptcy protection. Texaco and Pennzoil later settled for $3 billion. Texaco emerged from bankruptcy in 1988 and was acquired by Chevron in 2001 for $39 billion.