Just How Many Regulations Is Goldman Exempt From?

Zero Hedge asks this question, since dealer managers for a recent offering by Regions Financial Corporation were Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan.

Yesterday, Goldman issued an Upgrade of Regions Financial to a Buy. This, of course, doesn't happen after a deal, since the company is in a regulatory "quiet period". The regulatory "quiet period" has always, up until now, been observed by the deal managers.

Got that, Upgrades don't happen---unless you are Goldman Sachs. In other words, the world of the politically connected corporations continues to spin just nicely, thank you.

Further, it appears that Zero Hedge also suspects the Upgrade came about because Goldman may have been holding some of the stock that they wanted to off load. Writes Zero:

... can Goldman also please vouch that it's prop desk had no exposure to RF stock. Because if it did, that would really take the Larry Summers prize for stock manipulation moment of the year.

The nature of regulators is that they put on so many regulations on the books that it is difficult, if not impossible, to operate by following all of them. Regulators will then ignore the violation of the rule breaking until they want to smack someone down. So let the next Lehman or Bear Stearns try something like Goldman just did and the SEC will be all over them.