The Settlement between the SEC and Goldman Sachs of July 2010 and the Following Misplaced Proposal of Imposing a Fiduciary Duty on Broker-Dealers

Abstract:     
This work is primarily focused on the settlement between the SEC and Goldman Sachs of July 2010 related to the structuring and marketing of a Collateralised Debt Obligation (CDO) known as Abacus 2007-AC1. A thorough discussion of this case leads to analyze the idea of a imposing a fiduciary duty on broker-dealers. This work explains why this proposal should be disregarded. Finally, it is given a glance to recent cases similar to the one between the SEC and Goldman Sachs.

Keywords: Investment banks, broker-dealers, Dodd-Frank Act, fiduciary duties, Goldman Sachs, SEC, CDO, ABACUS, Securities Law, Finance Law

JEL Classification: K22, N20, G20, G21, G24, G14, G15, G18, F30, F20, F23, F00

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