Stop Praising the SEC
Posted at 12:15 p.m. on Dec. 3, 2012
William Cohan is tired of the accolades for retiring Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Schapiro, making the case that “Schapiro did a lousy job as head of the SEC.”
“What we needed was an SEC that would not only do its primary job of protecting investors from the likes of Bernie Madoff but also would hold Wall Street executives accountable for their extraordinarily bad — and, yes, in some cases criminal — behavior leading up to the 2007 and 2008 financial crisis.”
“What President Barack Obama gave us in Schapiro was yet another Wall Street regulator deeply indebted to Wall Street itself… Now Obama has added insult to injury by naming Elisse Walter, a crony of Schapiro’s from Finra and a current SEC commissioner, as Schapiro’s successor… If Obama keeps Walter on or appoints Khuzami or Ketchum, we would be better off blowing up the SEC and starting over.”
