It's still early in the trading day and anything could happen. But the financial apocalypse is not yet upon us. Despite the failure or firesale of three gigantic financial institutions over the weekend and hysteria in the financial press, the Dow Jones index of blue-chip stocks is down little more than 2% this morning. That takes stocks back to where they were on Thursday morning. Here's the market in realtime. (And now back to our regular panic.)

Not surprisingly, the demise of Lehman Brothers is keeping plenty of people busy on Ebay, where a long list of Lehman-related items can now be yours, assuming you're actually willing to pay good money for a ratty, sweat-stained baseball cap. But you can always think of it as charity. Since some of these ex-Lehman employees may not be working for a bit, buying their junk might just help them put food on the table until another job rolls around. Some of the items up for grabs:

If you're a little bored today and you're interested in reading Lehman Brothers massive bankruptcy petition—which may do down as the biggest bankruptcy is U.S. history—you can do so here. [Dealbook]

The morning news is terrifying even before the ominous opening of U.S. markets today, and was also scary hours ago before overseas markets opened and U.S. stock futures fell sharply. The bankruptcy at Lehman Brothers, the takeover of Merrill Lynch and the plea by insurance giant AIG for $40 billion in federal aid made for scary front pages (pictured, click for larger image) and heated chatter on CNBC. And no one wasted any time telling everyone how bad things really are. The "American financial system was shaken to its core," the Wall Street Journal said, warning of a "crisis on Wall Street." Other media outlets were scarcely more comforting:

Photos taken outside Lehman's offices over the weekend. More pics after the jump.

• After frantic takeover talks with Bank of America and Barclays ended over the weekend—and after the U.S. government declined to provide a bailout—Lehman Brothers was forced to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection this morning, marking an end to the 158-year-old firm. [Bloomberg, NYT, WSJ]

Is it awful or wonderful that Slate launched its business website The Big Money the same day three large Wall Street institutions were in various stages of freefall? Characteristically, Slate takes the contrarian view: It's wonderful! Tons of news to cover! They'll "tap into people's... anxiety about the economy!" The joys of financial fearmongering aside, the implosion of financial services does tend to call into question how many more ads the site can sell to the likes of American Express. Also, two words: Portfolio magazine. Editor James Ledbetter (recently of CNNMoney.com) still isn't daunted:

Go figure: There were two Lehman Brothers-related weddings announced in Sunday's Times. The "for poorer" section of the vows must have rung brutally even before the company officially headed for bankruptcy, since the company was clearly in trouble before the weddings took place Saturday.

158-year old investment bank Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy Sunday after banks Bank of America and Barclays refused to bail it out without government backing. But that doesn't mean anybody — including the IT guys — is getting the day off Monday. "We are counting on you to be at work on Monday and ready for business as usual," writes Lehman managing director Hari Gopalkrishan in an email obtained by Wall Street gossip blog Dealbreaker that we've copied below. In case your curious, popular lore has it that the last song Titanic's musicians played while the ship went down was "Nearer My God to Thee."

Does. Not. Look. Good. This is very ominous. I know most of us are probably not financial professionals, but tomorrow's stock market performance could be disastrous for the economy writ large. Glad I don't own anything of any consequence, like a house, or stock, or a company. Links of concern after the jump... Hang on. Expect to see shell-shocked bankers, and greedy-eyed hedge funders, in the streets of Manhattan. The Mother of All Mondays [WSJ] Wall Street Prepares for a Grim Monday [CNBC]

If you're JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon or Bank of America chief Ken Lewis and you're conferring with your lawyers today about making a bid for Lehman Brothers, allow us to show you one other asset that will (presumably) come with the purchase: the Lehman jet. Sure, you guys already have a few planes at your disposal (see here for Dimon's ride), but the Bombardier BD-700 Global Express is super-sweet ride. And it's the same exact model that Oprah has. Click here for a larger picture of the plane.

Sorry! If you were looking to pick up bofalehman.com, barclayslehman.com or hsbclehman.com, they've all been taken. [Dealbook, Dealbreaker]

Sharp-eyed readers of this morning's Wall Street Journal may notice that editor and Briton Robert Thomson has imported to the financial paper not just the starchy crispness of his old Financial Times but a dash of London's Fleet Street, as well. Read to the end of the front-pager on Lehman Brothers shopping itself and you'll find, as Daily Intelligencer did, that the Journal has truly redefined what it means by "Heard On The Street." In addition to being the title of the paper's bread-and-butter finance column, the phrase now literally describes how Journal reporters collect information. From the article:

On a day like today, you might expect the assistant to Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld to be particularly stressed out as her boss frantically tries to find someone—anyone—to acquire the faltering investment bank. She sounds pretty upbeat and energetic to us, but we'll let you be the judge.

Other parties (in addition to Bank of America) rumored to be looking into buying Lehman Brothers today: the Chinese sovereign wealth fund China Investment Co., and J. Christopher Flowers' JC Flowers. [FT via Dealbreaker]

• Will today be Lehman's last day as an independent firm? Last-minute discussions continue with several possible rescuers, including Bank of America and possibly Barclays, and the Fed has said it has no plans to bail out the nation's fourth-largest investment bank. [WSJ, NYT, Bloomberg]
  

Goldman Sachs is not buying Lehman Brothers, contrary to reports earlier today, "reflecting concerns that integrating two investment banks would be too disruptive." With Lehman's stock now down another 40% today (and more than 70% on the week thus far), all credible offers will be taken into consideration. Interested? Please call 212-526-7000 and ask to speak to Dick. [Reuters]

Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim's $127 million investment in the New York Times Company made headlines this morning, but left unremarked upon, including by the Times itself, are the murkier aspects of how Slim made his fortune. Yes, Slim acquired control of telephone monopoly Telmex in 1990 when it privatized in part by smartly partnering with Southwestern Bell and France Telecom. It's also true he has strongly denied there was anything untoward about the $1.7 billion purchase price, even though the company just 14 years later was valued at $37 billion. But Slim's financial support for the ruling PRI party, including a $25 million donation at a notorious 1993 fundraising dinner, was at the very least leveraged in an unseemly manner elsewhere. Slim went on to use his "influence over the government" to fight off the entry of competing phone companies into the impoverished Mexican market — that according to the Times itself in 2006. And what of the billionaire as a "decent philanthropist"?

Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld will walk away with an exit package worth $214 million if, as some analysts suggest, he steps down voluntarily and retires to a life of golf alongside Chuck Prince and Stan O'Neal. [The Deal via Dealbreaker]

Shares in Lehman Brothers plummeted by 40 percent today after it was reported that talks to sell a stake in the fourth-largest investment bank to Korea's KDP had ended. If you work there and you've yet to dust off your resume, tonight would be a good time to do so. [Reuters, Dealbreaker]