The names were suggested by employees in a jokey email exchange released as part of a case against Morgan Stanley by a Taiwanese bank concerning a $500m collection of mortgage-backed securities sold at the height of the housing bubble, according to ProPublica senior reporter Jesse Eisinger

Morgan Stanley responded in a statement, saying: “While the e-mail in question contains inappropriate language and reflects a poor attempt at humour, the Morgan Stanley employee who wrote it was responsible for documenting transactions. It was not his job or within his skillset to assess the state of the market or the credit quality of the transaction being discussed.”

Although the suggested names – which also included ‘Mike Tyson’s Punchout’ – were jokes, the release of the emails also indicated serious concerns among some employees.

In one email from 21 Oct 2005 published by ProPublica, an employee warned a banker about the mortgages bought by Morgan Stanley. “The real issue is that the loan requests do not make sense,” he wrote.

One borrower presented as earning $12,000 a month as the operation manager of an unknown company turned out to be a tarot reading house, he reported.

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In the event, $415m of the $500m of assets backing the deal with the Taiwanese bank and others ended up worthless.