While the new owners of the campuses got the schools at a discount and Corinthian shed huge amounts of liability, former students who claim they were swindled into taking out federal loans to attend classes are stuck with their debts.
But a tie-up is predicated on a certain amount of liabilities, and the outcome of the investigation could affect the ultimate numbers.
There is a similar amount of liabilities that are not shown, but there is no way to know just how they match up with the assets in terms of riskiness.
You need to understand how much a company is worth by subtracting the amount of liabilities that a company has from the company's total assets.
The amount of liability may also be determined by reference to a statute.
The authors also suggested potentially lowering the minimum amount of liability insurance that lower-income households are required to purchase.
Finally, Ms. Clement of HUB said that homeowners should always make sure they have an adequate amount of liability coverage included in their homeowner's policy.
The yearly premium for punitive-damage coverage starts at about $1,500, Mr. Eveleigh said, depending on the deductible and the amount of liability coverage.
The company said it would add $850 million before taxes to its reserves of $335 million to settle the claims, and that it had no estimate for the amount of liability it would still face after 2003.
With Bear, JPMorgan also inherits a balance sheet that is packed with financial land mines, though the Fed has agreed to protect the firm from a certain amount of liability.
Given the new potential for an enormous amount of liability on the part of the government, the lawyers for the plaintiffs urged the government to consider making a settlement with everyone who was affected by the floods in the greater New Orleans area — even residents of zones where Judge Duval has already ruled the corps is not liable.
