The demise of Lehman Brothers a year ago sparked a collapse in financial market confidence and set of a series of reactions that have spread hardship into the four corners of the globe.

Reuters News has charted the key events and their impact in "Times of Crisis" -- a major new multimedia production on Reuters.com. (See it here.)

We'd like to add the experiences of Reuters readers. So, if you or your family have been affected by the events of the past year then use the comments section below to share your story.

Sorry seems to be the hardest word in many walks of life - but for hard-nosed bosses  of financial institutions it seems to be even tougher, even during the credit crunch.

A recent notable exception was Richard Fuld, CEO of collapsed Lehman Brothers, who told U.S. lawmakers earlier this month he took full responsibility for his actions and felt “horrible about what has happened to the company,” but insisted he shared the blame with regulators and Congress.

Maybe actual apologies are thin on the ground because our world has become so complex that there is never one single person responsible for the collapse of a bank or  the failure of a company.

Do you think an apology can make a difference? And who should apologise - the bosses, the regulators or all those who promised that investing in the stockmarket would return pots of gold for investors?

Is it me or is Schadenfreude on the march? In the midst of all the headlines about wealthy bankers facing the ‘new reality’ of unemployment and comment about them not being terribly worthy of sympathy on account of their vast past bonuses, it’s as well to remember that not everyone can be sanguine about being cast out of work and that every job lost is a potential human tragedy.

 When big employers like Lehman Brothers collapse and others shed vast numbers of staff, there will be numerous people who face severe difficulties. And that’s something that some of those who seem to be revelling in the bankers’ misfortune would do well to remember.

In a crisis as deep and as global as this it won’t just be a few “City slickers” who lose out.

It’s certainly a lesson a fellow customer in my local Starbucks could well heed. Admittedly I was still waiting for my morning caffeine shot to kick in and was therefore half asleep at the time, but I came to in irritation as I absorbed his tasteless and feeble jokes about the meltdown in the financial system and the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

The man, himself smartly dressed in thick City pinstripes and silk tie, seemed barely able to contain himself as he waxed lyrical about the waning fortunes of all those highly paid bankers and their erstwhile bonuses. How he laughed.

Cue a brief injection of compassionate common sense from his friend and there came a teeny little bit of sorrow for all the back office and administrative staff at Lehmans who would, he admitted, not have benefitted from the same safety cushion of bonuses as their former masters would have done.

No bonus, no Schadenfreude? That’s alright then.

  ***For full coverage of the crisis click here***

British newspapers were united in their scathing condemnation of high finance now laid low and the failure of regulatory authorities to rein in what they see as the greed-fuelled excesses of the banking sector. 

Only Hank Paulson, the man who said “no” to a Lehman Bros bailout emerges with any credit in the eyes of the leader writers — along perhaps with legendary investor Warren Buffett who in 2002 condemned the derivatives that lie behind the current crash as “financial weapons of mass destruction”.

Most papers note that markets wobbled but did not panic and they predict swift legislation to stiffen up banks’ capital requirements.

If that happens, the Financial Times said,  ”the banking system will look more like that of the 1960s — a low-risk, low-return utility business”.  

Of Paulson it says: “The Treasury’s calculated risk (in letting Lehman sink) looks better judged than those of a banking system intoxicated by bail-outs.”   

“Nightmare on Wall Street,” was the Guardian’s banner headline, noting the events of the past few days would have been relished by Karl Marx.

“Two pillars of the modern economic temple — greed and prosperity — are trembling in a manner unseen for a very long time. The weather in the money markets is now bleaker than it has been since the 1930s,” it said.

Fortunately, the Guardian notes, there is more to economic life than high finance and that the economy as a whole is not in the dire condition it fell into in the early 1980s and early 1990s.

“The urgent task for the authorities now is to stop the rot from spreading from the money men to the rest of us,” it concluded.

The mood of anger was expressed thus by the Daily Telegraph: ”These banks have lived high on the hog by lending irresponsibly through an era of unfeasibly cheap money. Now comes the reckoning — but we will all pay the price.” 

The paper also suggests that because the bubble built up and burst on the Republicans’ watch, the party may pay a price come the Nov. 4 U.S. Presidential election.

The Daily Mirror takes a swipe at Lehman Brothers chairman Richard Fuld, who rejected several earlier buy-out offers for the bank.  Next to a headline “The Gorilla of Greed” it says: “This is the super-rich banker known as the Gorilla whose greedy bungling will send our mortgage bills spiralling again.”

The Daily Mail is among several papers making the point that Britain may feel the shockwaves from the credit crunch fallout more than most countries because of its reliance on financial services as a significant component of its GDP.

But what does it all mean for Sun readers, asked Britain’s best-selling daily tabloid.

“The answer is that we will pay a price for unscrupulous bankers who threw caution — and our money — to the winds,” it said.

“Too many people in positions of trust turned a blind eye. Phantom deals were fuelled by eye-watering bonuses which tempted greedy account managers to cut corners and break rules.

“This has been a catastrophic disaster for the credibility of the money markets on which all our futures depend. Thos who had a hand in it should be named, shamed … and sacked without a cent in compensation.”