But Tom Kirkendall, a lawyer and an expert on the prosecution of former Enron executives, reckons Mr Skilling has a good chance because the prosecutors relied overwhelmingly on the honest-services charges in their closing remarks to the jury.

ECONOMIST: Corporate crime

Mr Kirkendall notes the striking difference between the government's aggressive prosecution of bosses after the corporate collapses at the start of the century and the lack so far of any charges being brought against former bosses of Wall Street firms that turned out, like Enron, to be houses of cards once their clients lost trust in them.

ECONOMIST: Corporate crime

Another possibility, suggests Mr Kirkendall, is that federal prosecutors have looked at the large number of successful appeals against the convictions they won in jury trials of executives from Enron and other firms, of which Mr Skilling's and Lord Black's are the latest, and have concluded that going after Wall Street executives is not worth the career risk.

ECONOMIST: Corporate crime