Trust. It is a big part of our lives. We place trust in our doctors, teachers, and employers, and when a bond of trust is broken, the results can be disastrous. When that happened at Enron, once one of the world’s largest companies, thousands of employees and investors saw their lives ruined. This is a true story of corporate greed that ended in bankruptcy and tragedy.
bond：絆
disastrous：破滅を招く、悲惨な
corporate greed：企業欲
Enron was once a leader in the global energy business, with assets in the billions. Enron In the 1990s, however, some of the company’s divisions were losing money. Executives feared the stock price would fall if the truth about the losses became known.
executive：幹部、重役
To make their balance sheets look better, executives moved losses and debts over to a large number of partnerships. This made it look like Enron was earning a lot more money than it actually was, which helped boost Enron’s stock price. The trickery also led to large executive bonuses, which were linked to the company’s stock price. In 2000 and 2001, while the company was in the red, executives took home some $400 million worth of bonuses!
boost：(値段など)を上げる
trickery：ごまかし
lead to X：Xにつながる
link to X：Xに関連付ける
be in the red：赤字である
(ref.) be in the black：黒字である
The story gets worse. As the stock started falling in 2001 from a high point of $90, executives sold more than $1 billion worth of stock. Yet employees were forbidden to sell the Enron stock in their retirement portfolios. Executives even encouraged employees to buy more Enron stock, telling them it was on the verge of rebounding!
forbid：禁じる
portfolio：ポートフォーリオ(銀行・個人などが所有する有価証券明細表)
be on the verge of X：Xの間際である
rebound：跳ね返る
But it was not. On December 2, 2001, Enron filed for bankruptcy. With assets of $62.8 billion, it was (at the time) the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history, and the company’s stock lost almost all its value. Thousands of employees who held Enron stock lost their life savings, as well as their pensions. Investors also suffered from the stock’s collapse.
file for bankruptcy：倒産を申請する
savings：蓄え
pension：年金
collapse：(株・物価などの)暴落、急落
The fall of Enron was a disaster: for the company, its employees and investors. It made the public and government mistrustful of the way corporations report their earnings and the way they pay their executives. In fact, as Enron fell, it also brought down its accounting firm: Arthur Andersen.
be mistrustful of X：Xを疑っている
break down：(会社を)解体する
accounting firm：会計事務所、経理会社