The sweetheart deals just keep coming. Lawbreakers at one bank after another are let off the hook as their shareholders write a check. And then they go out and repeat the illegal behavior they promised not to do in the last settlement.
It shouldn’t be surprising that this keeps happening over at the SEC – especially as long as Robert Khuzami continues to serve as Director of the Commission’s Division of Enforcement.
But while each of these deals has been shameful, destructive, and outrageous, the $22 million agreement with Goldman Sachs which the SEC announced today – another one in which the guilty party “neither confirms nor denies wrongdoing” – looks like the worst one yet.
The SEC has the power to shut Goldman Sachs down for what it did, and the offenses it describes are felonies. But they just gave out another slap on the wrist – no, make that a pat on the wrist – with today’s announcement.
He’s at again – and we’re glad. A lot of smart people are dedicating their lives to fighting the corrosive effect of Wall Street on our economy and our democracy, but the best spokesman for that cause comes from Wall Street itself.
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon is still the poster child for today’s morally degraded, self-entitled banker mentality. I don’t know why he keeps talking, but he’s the gift that keeps on giving.
At every major junction in the post-crisis debate about banking, Dimon has stepped in with a perfectly tactless remark that illustrates both the vacuity and the moral corruption of his industry. This week was no exception.
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