They had fun, fun, fun; until the stock plunged 45 percent

This is not quite like Enron, which also had a lot of debt secured by a promise to issue stock. There is more disclosure here, and the AES debt is on its balance sheet. But there are similarities. If its business situation deteriorates and it faces problems in borrowing money, AES could have to issue a huge number of shares.

Sometimes a plan that looks great turns out to be no fun at all.