International Investing

Why didn’t Goldman get in on the action? Probably because the fee was too low:

BlackRock has been turned to for advice in previous times of turmoil. The firm worked with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Resolution Trust Corp. during the savings-and-loan crisis. And in 1994 it advised General Electric Co. after its Kidder Peabody brokerage unit ran into trouble.

This time around, the initial job was designed as a four-day stint paying the firm $125,000. It had to be a fast-turnaround job because some of the municipalities that had parked cash in the pool were already struggling to pay salaries and bills and meet bond payments.