There was no crime, no malice, just an unprecedented chain of events. So reads the epitaph of Peregrine, Asia's high-flying investment bank that spectacularly went to the wall during the regional financial crisis.
Peregrine was an ambitious operation striving to become a significant player with limited resources. A savage downturn in mid-1997 was, however, to reveal structural weaknesses at the group: a yawning gap between its appetite for risk and control systems in place to keep the bank in check.
Six years down the line, and a government probe and criminal investigation later, a core question is still being asked.
Given underlying flaws in Peregrine's credit controls and management shortcomings outlined in the 2001 government-commissioned probe into the group's demise, had its directors in some way allowed the collapse to happen?
Two of Peregrine's former board members, chairman Philip Tose and finance director Peter Wong Wing-cheong, now face being stripped of directorships at the High Court for their conduct leading up to the company's downfall.
Unlike many directors who are banished from the boardroom, the pair did not steal any money. They did not accept bribes, massage the accounts, inflate the company's earnings or burn the books.