It’s been a busy week for the SEC. On Wednesday, the regulatory agency took a small, but important first step toward shining light on the very dark, very unregulated world of high frequency trading. And now come charges of civil fraud levied at Goldman Sachs. Talk about a double whammy. In the old days, the SEC would’ve put its feet up and called it a week after the high-frequency trading action. But following it up two days later by charging the biggest, baddest bank in the world with $1 billion of fraud? Who does the SEC think it is? The country’s financial watch dog? Let’s hope so...
We may be witnessing the first real signs of a newly empowered SEC under chair Mary Schapiro. She’s been in the job for over a year, and while critics have been on her for a slow start and giving Wall Street a pass, it must be noted that she’s had her work cut out for her. As Congress gears up to pass financial reform, Schapiro finally seems to have started to turn the SEC back toward its stated purpose of regulating, rather than enabling, Wall Street...
The charges certainly took the market by surprise. But more importantly this may be the first shot fired in the SEC’s war against the kind of financial practices that helped bring on the crisis. Judging by the words of an SEC official, who tells NEWSWEEK that agency is investigating the CDO structuring and marketing practices of “a number of Wall Street firms.” It would appear so...
Matthew Philips
http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/wealthofnations/archive/2010/04/16/goldman-sachs-has-the-sec-finally-grown-a-pair-under-mary-schapiro.aspx
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