Ten years ago this month, the New York Fed orchestrated the orderly unwinding of hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management, which foundered on exposures to Russian government bonds.

FORBES: Reported Merrill deal talks--just the latest surprise.

But ten years ago the Fed helped organise the rescue of Long-Term Capital Management, a hedge fund (although no public money was involved).

ECONOMIST: The credit crunch

By November 2007, when the narrative ends, it was already clear to Mr Morris that this crisis was much more serious than the last big crunch, the 1998 Russian debt default and the bail-out of Long-Term Capital Management, an American hedge fund, by a group of banks under the Fed's direction.

ECONOMIST: The credit crunch

In 1998 turmoil in financial markets including the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management, a hedge fund once thought too brainy to fail helped persuade the Fed, then led by Mr Greenspan, into three quick rate cuts that contributed to the dotcom bubble.

ECONOMIST: CSI: credit crunch | The

Only last autumn, the Fed had to save world finance by masterminding the rescue of Long-Term Capital Management, a hedge fund, and cutting interest rates three times.

ECONOMIST: Greenspan lets things simmer