The term "carbanion" has been applied by synthetic organic chemists for decades to denote carbon-based anionic species [1]. In doing so, structural aspects are knowingly ignored. The basis of traditional and modern carbanion chemistry is formed by the many different types of organolithium reagents, including alkyllithium compounds, lithiated heterocycles, and deprotonated forms of carbonyl compounds (enolates), nitriles, nitroalkanes, sulfoxides, sulfones, and other CHacidic precursors [1,2]. In addition to purely synthetic aspects, considerable effort has gone into the study of the structural properties of these reagents [3]. Indeed, it has long been accepted that carbanions are not involved at all; rather, lithium is intimately bonded to the nucleophilic species which occur as monomers, dimers or higher aggregates.In contrast to these and other organometallic reagents, the scientific community took a different view of metal-free anionic systems. Specifically, the tetraalkylammonium salts of CH-acidic compounds such as esters, ketones, nitriles, nitroalkanes, and sulfones were believed to be naked anions and therefore true carbanions However, detailed structural studies in the solid phase and in solution of compounds of the type 2 showed that the concept of naked anions does not apply at all [11]. Indeed, these and other tetraalkylammonium salts of CH-acidic compounds, e.g., those of 2-nitropropane [12], phenylacetic acid ester [13] or phenylpropionic acid ester [13], are not true carbanions. The tetrabutylammonium units are not isolated cations, but are in fact intimately associated with the carbon nucleophiles. This novel phenomenon is based on strong hydrogen bonds originating from the α-methylene units of the tetrabutylammonium cations as H-donors and the negatively charged oxygen atoms in the enolates 2 (or in nitronates) as H-acceptors (CH···O interactions) [14]. Relevant are MO calculations on (CH 3 ) 4 N + , which show that the positive charge is not localized on nitrogen as traditionally drawn by organic chemists, but delocalized evenly over the four methyl groups [9]. This also means that the methyl groups (or α-methylene groups in R 4 N + ) are somewhat acidic. Interestingly, in the case of enolates 2 eight of the CH···O interactions occur in such a way that a dimer-