Wall St. pow-wow in DC: Top 10 firms to talk with regulators about probes

DAILY NEWS ^ | 10/23/02 | DANIEL DUNAIEF, DAILY NEWS BUSINESS WRITER

[groanup]

A bunch of lawyers from the big investment banks and a bunch of lawyers from the government getting together to decide how the banks will separate sales and research. Sounds like a pack of wolves and a pack of coyotes deciding how to manage sheep.

Here's an idea. Don't listen to ANY investment advice from Wall Street.

[Liz]

Great idea. Good advice.

[Drop the Vernacular]

"Don't listen to ANY investment advice from Wall Street."

Agreed. Any settlement, short of complete divestment of the research unit (not saying I advocate the government forcing this) will fail to remove the conflict of interest problem. I suspect that all these settlements will have the unintended consequence of making investors rely even more on the research which will still be biased and still be no more useful than randonly thowing darts at the Wall Street Journal.

Why would anyone expect unbiased advice from an investment bank? When these investors buy a car, do they expect a Cadillac dealer to give them unbiased opinions on the Cadillac vs. a Lexus?

[Donald Stone]

Deutsche Bank, Merrill Lynch, UBS Warburg, Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and Credit Suisse First Boston are all expected to send their general counsel or top lawyers.

The FIX is in !!!!

Let me guess, Jack Quinn (Marc Rich's attorney)will be making the necessary arrangements for all the "usual suspects"

I see there is a summit meeting in Washington D.C. of our top white collar organized crime syndicates which means our elected and appointed officials will be standing in line to receive corporate donations to make all this wrong doing go away.

Ironic that there is currently a request before a federal judge in New York asking that federal criminal indictments be brought against Goldman Sachs for alleged racketeering for offering assets bought from an alleged organized crime syndicate and then bundled into an IPO.

[Liz]

Quick....somebody speed-dial Harvey Pitt and fill him in....LOL.

[Fracas]

Hmmm. A cabal?

[Fred Mertz]

Donald, thanks for the additional tidbits.

[Liz]

More like partners in crime............ LOL

[groanup]

"Why would anyone expect unbiased advice from an investment bank? When these investors buy a car, do they expect a Cadillac dealer to give them unbiased opinions on the Cadillac vs. a Lexus?"

Exactly. Who would spend thousands of dollars for dog and pony shows, golf outings etc to garner investment banking business and turn around and say something bad about the company's stock before you've had the opportunity to make a couple of million selling it? What a joke.

[razorback-bert]

Wall Street is acting like cats covering up in a concrete litter box.

[mssnoop]

The minutes of these meetings should be public records that the public can review. Let the paper trail roll out!

You are right the fix is on - all under the guise of protecting the fragile economy. There are some very high level officials involved to Salomon Smith Barney and this investigation has to be shut down.

[arete]

The FIX is in !!!!

Right on target except that the fix HAS been in ever since Spitzer accepted 100 million from MER to make "their probems" go away. It is all about appearing to be tough on the Wall Street criminals while doing very little. NO criminal charges will be filed. So the message is that it is okay to rob the public as long as you give the lawyers and politicians a cut of the take. It is a disgrace.

Richard W.

[STONEWALLS]

"The two sides are meeting as a single group for the first time. They hope to work towards a framework to separate research from investment banking that works for all of them."

..Hmm..."a framework...that works for all of THEM"....how about something that works for US!!....something that looks out for OUR interests as individual investors....

Good luck to everybody!!

Stonewalls

[arete]

The Wall Street criminals own the Washington political criminals. They are only different parts of the same corrupt orgainization. All the posturing is for media hype and PR for the sheep so that they don't lose "confidence" in the system that will scam them again and again. Spitzer is as corrupt as any analyst. All a game played out by the power elite and ruling class.

Richard W.

[Liz]

.....how about something that works for US!!....something that looks out for OUR interests as individual investors....

Dream on fellow FReeper......

[Liz]

Picturesque way of saying what we're all thinking........

[Boyd]

#2 was pretty succinct.

[Moonman62]

Here's an idea. Don't listen to ANY investment advice from Wall Street.

Exactly. Anybody who does a little research and backtesting can figure out that listening to sell-side analysts is a bad idea. This is a case of the government spending millions of our dollars to make it look like it is doing something, under the assumption that all investors are incredibly stupid.

[Russell Scott]

Worship God, not money, and the appetite for greed will be greatly reduced.