Germany state lender KfW transferred €300 million to Lehman Brothers on the day the US giant filed for bankruptcy.
The German finance ministry said it’s astonished at the news and demanded an explanation.
"What we have had to read today is astonishing and exasperating," finance ministry spokesman Torsten Albig said when asked about reports of the transfer last week.
"We expect a swift explanation of such a technical failure, which is inexplicable to us, but which will hopefully be explained soon," he said.
The German lender KfW said earlier this week it made a €300 million mistake by transferred the funds to Lehman on the day the investment bank filed for bankruptcy.
In Germany The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper reported that the payment was due to an erroneous swap payment.
The swap is a derivative where two counterparties agree to exhange one stream of cash flows against another.
The lender has already taken a liquidity hit after the sale of IKB, Germany’ biggest casualty of the crisis.
