Before the bell: Huge sell-off ahead; LEH, MER, AIG, WAG, TTWO, AAPL, SIRI

Wall Street is swimming in red this morning, bracing for a huge stock selloff Monday following the weekend's happenings: Lehman files for bankruptcy, Merrill is sold and AIG is scrambling to raise cash. Global markets were down sharply in the wake of the news out of the U.S. Meanwhile, in the background of all this, oil prices fell below $97 a barrel on Monday as Hurricane Ike inflicted minimal damage to oil installations.Some economic data will be out today, but will likely take second stage to all the goings on.
Around 7:20 Dow futures were down 365 points, S&P 500 and Nasdaq futures down nearly 50 points.

Lehman Brothers (NYSE: LEH) filed a Chapter 11 petition with U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan, a victim of the crisis it helped create. That's after Bank of America and Barclays (NYSE: BCS) decided not to purchase it without the aid of the Treasury. Shares of Lehman opened down 84% in Europe and are over 87% down in pre-market trading to $3.20.

Meanwhile, Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) sold itself to Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) in an all-stock transaction worth about $50 billion. The purchase price values the company at more than $29 a share, at least a 70% premium from Merrill's closing price on Friday of $17.05. While MER shares are up over 36% in pre-market trading, BAC's are down over 13%.

Then there is American International Group (NYSE: AIG), which said Sunday it is reviewing its operations and discussing possible options with outside parties to improve its business, some interpreted this as asking the Federal Reserve for a $40 billion loan. AIG stock is down over 42% in pre-market trading.

Other related news stories are mostly of attempts to calm the market:

• The Federal Reserve announced plans Sunday to loosen its lending restrictions to the banking industry.
• The ECB and BOE pumped cash into markets
• A consortium of 10 leading domestic and foreign banks, including Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, Barclays and Morgan Stanley, agreed to create a $70 billion fund to lend to troubled financial firms.