Will SEC let Goldman settle or file criminal charges?

http://bit.ly/7XwAG

The crafty Blankfein who only weeks ago was all swagger when the charges of fraud was filed by SEC, is now a firm believer in the policy "he who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day."

Soon after the SEC charges were filed, Senator Levin lead a team of Congessmen to grill and demolish the two stalwarts of Goldman, the CEO Blankfein and the VP Fabrice Tourre or the self proclaimed Fabulous Fab. The public humilation of the high profile Bankers called 'Cheats and Banksters' by the visibly aggressive activist community through fiesty posters in the courtroom was beyond imagination of Goldman's battery of specialised lawyers assembled at the court. They were always convinced that these master manipulators, who had fooled many a corporate honcho while selling them fuzzy CDO's and CDS, could confuse the politicians in the web of financial complexities that the instruments were deemed to possesss.

However Senator Levin, a master of many such battles was equal to the task and caught the uber confident Blankfein wrong footed, on more than one occassion. The grilling of fabulous Fab was even more devastating as he was trapped in his own web of words.By the end of the day Blankfein was visibly worried and Greg Palm the deputy chief council in the Goldman case was talking compromise. Council Palm approached the SEC next day with an idea of resolving the case and gave a PR pitch to investors that you always could end up paying more if you don't settle early and "you always have the option" of settling if both sides forge an binding agreement.

Though a settlement of around $ 500 million is in sight, as judges may not permit a fine of $1 billion , the SEC should be bold enough to reject any such offer and push for the criminal conspiracy case , in which the offenders could be jailed. This is because it is possibly the last chance to nail the serial offenders, who got a providential reprieve and support, only a year ago with the TARP funds which was given to help write off the Toxic assets. Instead the toxic assets are being palmed off to unsuspecting European investors, and it is reported that Blankfein's recent trip to Asia was to get the emerging economies into their vicious loop.

The once desperate banks are now healthy and bloated distributing the most liberal gilt edged salaries and bonus in the history America. Nothing wrong with that, if they had truely made an effort to write off part of the toxic assets, and set up systems to control market volatility and risk. Goldman did nothing of that. Instead they come back with twice the vigour to hedge and punt and destroy the economy with volatile short-selling. Any weakness by the SEC will destroy the financial system within America and faith in the US regulatory mechanism, which already as per Caroline Baum of Bloomberg is under the influence of Babes, Booze and expense accounts. ================================================================================================================================================================================================================================================