Laughing at the thought of a Wall Street Crisis from 2004 S.E.C Meeting
On Oct. 2, 2008, the New York Times published a follow-up story on the fiasco that occurred on Wall Street over a period of time.
Reporter Stephen Labaton was present at the 2004 meeting where members of Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, and Bear Sterns pleaded to be release from a limited regulation to the S.E.C board.
The regulation had restricted the investment banks to allow their brokerage subdivisions to take on a certain “amount” of debt they could possibly handle. With the exemption, these firms would be able to tap into the billions of dollars that were on reserve.
Ironically, current Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson was chairman of Goldman Sachs at the meeting before stepping down two years later.
Here is an audio clip from Back Story with the Times:
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/podcasts/2008/10/03/03backstory-labaton.mp3
What do you think?