Citing figures from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, a source has speculated that all the major American banks managed to temporarily lower their debt levels just before reporting over the past five quarter, which made it look like their balance sheet were less risky.

The report, put forward on Friday, said that big banks of the country including Goldman Sachs Group, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America, among others, had understated the debt levels which were used to fund securities trading by pulling them down by an average of 42% at the end of each quarter.

In the middle of the successive quarter, however, the banks did increase their debt, it has been speculated.

It is now a well known fact that excessive leverage by the major US banks was one of the biggest reasons which led to the global financial meltdown of 2008.

None of the giant banks named in the report have come out with a comment or explanation yet.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York has decided not to react to the speculation as well.