Running for cover. (The Week in Review).

Investment News, July, 2002 by Gabriel, Frederick P., Jr.

* Surprise, surprise. WorldCom Inc., the long-distance telephone and data-services company that is at the center of a $3.85 billion accounting scandal, may file for bankruptcy protection as early as this week, according to reports published Thursday. A bankruptcy filing by the Clinton, Miss., company, which transmits half the world's Internet traffic, would dwarf the Chapter 11 filing by scandal-ridden Houston energy trader Enron Corp.

as the nation's largest insolvency. A WorldCom spokesman declined to comment. But CEO John Sidgmore said July 9 that a decision on whether to seek bankruptcy protection or some other financial reorganization would be made within three weeks.