NY Times DealB%k (purportedly having a former relationship with Goldman SAchs) - reports on the recent settlement
(NOTE: DEALBOOK refused to permit yours truly from commenting on the story)
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/09/19/goldman-settles-lawsuit-over-etoys-i-p-o/
Firedoglake has this story
"Mistakenly Released Documents Reveal Goldman Sachs Screwed IPO Clients"
As noted in the Roundup, Goldman Sachs is once again being cited for ripping off its clients, this time in the IPO space. Goldman had already paid massive fines for causing the mortgage crisis by selling its own clients toxic assets. Later the firm would take considerable reputational damage when a former Goldman Sachs executive, Greg Smith, wrote an Op-Ed for the New York Times where he claimed Goldman employees routinely took advantage of the firm’s clients and enjoyed mocking them afterwards – the birth of the “Muppet” meme.
Now Joe Nocera has obtained, due to a clerical error, documents detailing Goldman Sachs screwing its IPO clients. Goldman’s clients, eToys, are in the midst of a lawsuit against Goldman. eToys is claiming Goldman conspired to keep the price of the IPO low to benefit their investment bank clients who gave Goldman a kickback in return. eToys later went out of business partly due to lacking capital that it could have raised in a more honest IPO.
Recently, however, I came across a cache of documents related to the eToys litigation that seem to tilt the argument in favor of the skeptics. Although the documents were supposed to be under seal, they were sitting in a file at the New York County Clerk’s Office, available to anyone who asked for them. I asked.
What they clearly show is that Goldman knew exactly what it was doing when it underpriced the eToys I.P.O. — and many others as well. (According to the lawsuit, Fitt led around a dozen underwritings in 1999, several of which were also woefully underpriced.) Taken in their entirety, the e-mails and internal reports show Goldman took advantage of naïve Internet start-ups to fatten its own bottom line
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