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Conflicts of Interest The Wall Street Plague

Assignment #1 Investment Analysis and Portfolio Management BFN 352

By: Marc Mills For: Prof. Valsan Due: Week 2 January 24, 2003

Table of Contents

Introduction..3 Brokerage Division Sell-side Analyst...3 Corporate Finance Division.4 Team Work...4 Recent Developments...5 The Data6 Ethical Practice.7 New Regulations...8 Conclusion...10 Bibliography11

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Conflicts of Interest in the Investment Industry When Money Interferes with Independence and Objectivity Introduction As we enter into 2003 we are still feeling the effects of the corporate scandals and other wrongdoings that have helped bring, and also keep, the economy in a near state of recession. The end of 2002 marked the third consecutive year of negative market indices, something that hasnt occurred since the 1940s. Over the past year the TSX was down 13.5%, the S&P500 was off 24% and the NASDAQ lost 30.5%. This economic downturn is the result of several things including weakening fundamentals in the economy such as increasing unemployment, low business spending and recently decreased consumer confidence from a consumer that can be held responsible for keeping the economy afloat over the last year thanks to their resilience. Furthermore, acts of terrorism and other geo-political tensions such as the recent developments with Iraq have further depressed the economy. One thing that has not been mentioned yet, but has played a large part in adding to the weakened economy and contributing to uncertainty in the market are the scandals that have emerged from the corporate world. These scandals are wide spread and range from insider trading to fraudulent accounting practices to conflicts of interest between underwriting firms and financial analysts who make security recommendations. Who can you trust now? Everybody seems to be in it for themselves trying to make the fast buck. Nobody wants to work for it anymore, the honors in the dollar (Todd, 2000). This paper will be exploring this latter part involving the conflict of interest that has been present for so long but only now has really began to catch the attention of the investment world. It will look at how the industry works, who is involved and finally what is being done to prevent this from reoccurring in the future. Within an investment firm you may find a brokerage division as well as a corporate finance division. While both of these divisions provide a source of income for the firm, the combination of the two can lead to potentially higher income for the firm. The problem however, is that the combination of these two branches of the firm can lead to a conflict of interest which goes against most standards of practice in regards to proper disclosure and fair dealing, which will be explored later. First I will look at the brokerage division and their sell-side analysts and then it will look at the corporate finance division of the firm, which is involved in completing IPO transactions, mergers and acquisitions, and equity offerings for its clients. With an understanding of how both of these areas of the firm work, you will get a better understanding of how the conflict of interest issues arises and what it entails. Brokerage Division Sell-side Analyst What exactly is a sell-side analyst and what role do they play at an investment firm? The analyst does just that, they analyze. Most analysts specialize in a specific sector of the economy such as the Telecommunication sector, Consumer Discretionary
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sector or the Information Technology sector to name a few. These analysts gather information on securities within their sector, including the companys financial position, management, and product base and so on. Analysts will often visit the companies that they are initiating coverage on and they will meet with the management team and tour the plant or facilities. In doing so they attempt to obtain an accurate overall picture of the company in question so that that they can eventually make a recommendation based on their findings. The research reports that are produced by these analysts are then sold to investors through the firms brokers (Dunn, 2000). These analysts also maintain ratings on the stocks that they cover usually in the form of buy, sell or hold ratings. Note that the ratings systems vary from firm to firm and can often be very confusing or misleading. There has been an effort however, to make these rating systems more understandable and clear for investors. On its own it seems like there is nothing wrong with what the analyst is doing and in most cases there is nothing wrong as long as the analyst is using independence and objectivity when doing their research. Corporate Finance Division If a private company was interested in going public, they would first find an investment bank that would price and issue their initial public offering (IPO). IPOs are an important source of income for the firm and these firms are always looking for new deals. Once they have done the IPO for a firm they are often used to issue a secondary offering which will generate substantial commissions. Furthermore, the corporate finance division also does merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions for their clients. Overall, these transactions provide a large amount of income for the firm, which means the more transactions completed the better. They cannot always get all of their business on their own however, and this is where the analysts come into the picture. Team work Now that you have an idea of what each division of the investment firm does you may have an idea of how a conflict of interest may arise between the two. The corporate finance department sees these analysts as a marketing tool, and a valuable one at that. They see the analyst as someone with influence on the market and their ratings can make or break a company. Given the right circumstances and monetary incentive, an analyst can produce a report that makes the investment look very favorable and help push the new issue of a companys stock. This will attract companies to their firm in order to issue an IPO because they believe they will get good coverage. This of course relates to more investment banking fees for the firm (a portion of which goes to the analyst who helped out) and everybody is happy. In the past the analyst was the watchdog for the shareholder and made an effort to make timely and accurate reports that would be in the best interest of the investor. As a result they were compensated for their services. The problem today however, is that analysts are getting paid based on fees received when the investment bank secures an IPO client. Basically a large portion of their pay is derived from investment banking transactions. Here is where the problem arises. The analyst wants to provide research reports that are independent and objective to the investor, but they also want to receive good compensation from giving a strong rating on a potential investment banking client.
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A stock rating that may help secure that client and generate large fees. In many cases their analysis of the potential company is not thorough or complete and may be fabricated to make the company appear better than it really is. This of course is not in the best interest of the investor and as a result there is a conflict of interest. John Coffee Jr., a law professor at Columbia Law School and a visiting professor at Harvard Law School explains what a conflict of interest in business is. He states that as an employee you owe a duty of loyalty to your employer, and you should not accept other kinds of interest or payments that could give you a reason to act contrary to the best interest of your employer or the persons to whom you owe a duty [shareholders] (Coffee, 2001). Therefore, based on this definition the analyst is clearly in a conflict of interest situation. First of all, the analyst should be loyal to his employer, which is the brokerage firm, not the investment banking firm. Secondly, he is receiving payment from the investment banking division that will most likely cause him to act in the best interest of the underwriters and not the best interest of the brokerage firm or the investors. Recent Developments This conflict of interest is not a new phenomenon on the streets. It has probably been around for quite a long time, but now someone is finally stepping up and taking action. The attorney general of New York State, Eliot Spitzer, is making a lot of noise on Wall Street these days and he has quickly become one of the most feared people on Wall Street (Gimein, 2002). Mr. Spitzer has been pushing a campaign against corruption in the financial world and has begun to expose the corruption taking place. Although he and his team have not actually prosecuted any firm or individual yet, they certainly have investment banks and their executives running for cover. Although Merrill Lynch never admitted to or denied allegations against them for misbehavior, the efforts of Spitzer made Merrill Lynch pay a $100 million dollar fine (Gimein, 2002). Regulators believed that analysts at Merrill Lynch were tailoring their stock picks to win investment banking business by recommending the stocks of Merrills banking clients (Gimein, 2002, p. 82). This is a clear example of a case of a conflict in interest as described above. Henry Blodget, a well-known Internet analyst with Merrill Lynch, made headlines for his actions and especially for e-mails that were written by him to co-workers describing the stock picks and ratings that he had made. For example, Blodget wrote an e-mail about a company named GoTo.net (now called Overture Services), saying that there was nuthin to it (Mann, 2002). This was a security that he was promoting to the public as a good buy, but behind closed doors he obviously had different feelings about the stock. Why was he doing this and what was his motivation behind these lies? Money. By promoting the stock he was helping the underwriters get potential investment banking fees. According to Roni Michaely and Kent Womack (2001), it is common for a significant portion of the analysts compensation to be determined by their helpfulness to the corporate finance division. What kind of figures are we looking at? Henry Blodgets salary jumped from $3 million in 1999 to $12 million in 2001. This increase was apparently due to his ability to bring home the bacon (Coursey, 2002). In other words, he was very helpful to the investment banking division.

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An e-mail from another Merrill Lynch analyst, Kristen Campbell explains it clearly:
if [this rating] means that we are putting half of Merrill retail into this stock because they are out accumulating it then I dont think thats the right thing to do. We are losing people money and I dont like it. John and Mary Smith are losing their retirement because we dont want [the CFO] of GoTo to be mad at us (Mann, 2002).

This e-mail demonstrates that they were just pushing the stock in question in order to satisfy the potential client in order to obtain their business and amass large fees. There is no duty to the investor here. In fact by giving these companies high ratings they are misleading the investors and causing these investors large financial losses in the process. The evidence appears to be quite clear that there was something going on and Spitzer believes that there was definitely enough evidence for prosecution. He felt however, that to indict Merrill for misbehavior that was endemic throughout the investment banking world would have been a mistake (Gimein, 2002, p. 82). He feels that just that fact that all of this has been exposed is a victory in itself as it will open the door to other similar cases and will get the ball rolling for future regulation changes. Another notable for Mr. Spitzer includes Salomon Smith Barney analyst Jack B. Grubman and some of his co-workers who publicly recommended several telecom companies and kept strong buy or buy ratings on the stocks even as then plunged, some even into bankruptcy (1). Some of the companies that Grubman recommended and went bankrupt include Global Crossing, Teligent and FLAG Telecom. Mr. Spitzer is also targeting other major firms on Wall Street including Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse First Boston and Goldman Sachs. As we have seen from the Blodget case or the Grubman investigation a sell recommendation is not a common or popular practice. According to a 2001 study conducted by Reuters (2), 88% of analysts surveyed said that if they issued a sell rating for a stock, the underlying company would retaliate. Retaliation methods would include minimizing the analysts access to the company and the executives, cutting the analysts employer out of future investment banking deals, suing the analyst and/or the firm, or trying to get the analyst fired (2, p. vii). It is no wonder then that you see very few sell ratings from analysts. According to Brian Bruce (October 2002), analysts claim that they are under a lot of pressure to issue favorable ratings for the investment banks clients or potential clients. The Data In order to see the effect of this conflict of interest it is worthwhile to examine that number and types of recommendations that analysts are giving and then exploring the results of these stock picks. Thompson Financial/First Call compiled a list of recommendations in July 2001 and discovered that almost 50% of all recommendations were buy recommendations while less than 1% were sell (Bruce, May 2002). Considering the current state of the economy and the position of many companies, it is hard to believe that these recommendations were justified.
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Roni Michaely of Cornell University and Kent Womack of Dartmouth did a study on the Conflict of Interest and the Credibility of Underwriter Analyst Recommendations. In their study they came up with several interesting findings. In one of their studies they compared a sample of IPO stocks given buy recommendations by analysts at lead underwriting firms with a sample given buy recommendations by non-underwriting analysts. The results of the study show a clear conflict of interest. Two years after the recommendations, the stocks relative performance was compared to other similar-sized stocks. Stocks that were recommended by non-underwriting-firm analysts outperformed similar stocks by almost 50%. On the other hand stocks that were recommended by underwriting-firm analysts under-performed by almost 20% (Foerster, 2001). What does this show? Well, it shows that the buy ratings from the underwriting-firm analysts were most likely just to promote the stock and secure investment banking business. The non-underwriting-firm analysts were not trying to make the stocks look better than they actually were and as a result presented a more accurate picture of the company. These are the kind of things that are probably going on in most investment firms and it will take a while before this can be stopped for good. Ethical Practice Whether it is through the Association for Investment Management and Research (AIMR), or through another regulatory body, all individuals in the investment industry have some form of ethical guidelines or a code of practice to which they must adhere to. Despite this fact however, we are seeing more and more corruption and unethical practice take place and this is undermining the nature of these regulatory bodies. The following is The Code of Ethics that must be followed by members of AIMR:
Members of the Association for Investment Management and Research shall: Act with integrity, competence, dignity, and in an ethical manner when dealing with public, clients, prospects, employees, and fellow members. Practice and encourage others to practice in a professional and ethical manner that will reflect credit on members and their profession. Strive to maintain and improve their competence and the competence of others in the profession. Use reasonable care and exercise independent professional judgment.

If you read through each one of these points and think of the events that have taken place over the last few years you can see that there is a lot of discrepancy between what has been happening and what is ethical. The events that have been described above that deal with conflicts of interest go against all of these points relating to ethics. If we look further into AIMRs Standards of Professional Conduct we can address some specific points that have been in violation. Standard IV. Relationships with and Responsibilities to Clients and Prospects A.3 Independence and Objectivity. Members shall use reasonable care and judgment to achieve and maintain independence and objectivity in making investment recommendation or taking investment action.

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Clearly this has been broken in all of the cases that have been mentioned thus far. By making investment recommendations in order to try and win investment banking contracts regardless of the actual performance of the underlying security the analyst is failing to act independently and the objectivity is lost. We must have analysts who are not compensated based on the transactions of the corporate finance division and this way they will not push a stock just for the sake of the money, but rather because it is a prudent investment. B.1 Fiduciary Duties. In relationships with clients, members shall use particular care in determining applicable fiduciary duty and shall comply with such duty as to those persons and interests to whom the duty is owed. Members must act for the benefit of their clients and place their clients interest before their own. I think that this is the major problem with the analysts. They are simply not putting the clients interest before their own. They owe a duty to the client to provide independent and objective research in a timely manner. However, the analyst also wants to help the investment banking division secure some potential contracts and this will cloud their judgment and make them issue recommendations that would not otherwise be issued. This is definitely against the best interest of the client. B.7 Disclosure of Conflicts to Clients and Prospects. Members shall disclose to their clients and prospects all matters, including beneficial ownership of securities or other investments, that reasonably could be expected to impair the members ability to make unbiased and objective recommendations. The fact that the analyst will be compensated well (in the case of Henry Blodget) for placing a buy rating on a crappy stock is most certainly a conflict and it will impair the analysts ability to make unbiased and objective recommendations. These are just a few examples showing how analysts and members of the investment community are practicing unethical investing and it is more often than not at the expense of the client. As a result investors have come to lose confidence in these analysts. In order to regain their confidence regulations must be put in place and enforced. New Regulations With the help of people like Eliot Spitzer and other regulatory groups such as the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Association for Investment Management and Research, Wall Street is beginning to crack down on such practices and is trying to build a wall between brokers and bankers. There are certain disclosure rules put in place by the NYSE and the NASD dealing with certain conflicts of interest for analysts when recommending the purchase or sale of specific securities. There have been recent rule changes put in place to try and increase the analysts independence and decrease future conflicts of interest. The SEC approved these rule changes (that will be outlined below) on May 10, 2002. There is an
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implementation period of between 60 and 180 calendar days for the new rules to be enforced in order to given sufficient time for firms to develop and implement the new rules. Here are some of the rules that will be put in place ( Source: U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Investor Alert): No promises of favorable research analysts will not be allowed to offer favorable research ratings or price targets with the goal of attracting investment banking opportunities. There is also a quiet period put in place that will prevent the underwriting firm from issuing reports on the company within 40 days after an IPO or within 10 days after a secondary offering. Limitations on Relationships and Communications this rule change prevents the analyst from being supervised by the investment banking department. This will protect the analyst from influences that could impair their objectivity and independence. Analyst Compensation you cannot tie an analysts compensation to specific investment banking transactions. Also if the compensation is based on the firms general investment banking revenue it must be disclosed. Firm Compensation the firm must disclose if it managed or comanaged a public offering for a company in the last 12 months. This will alert investors to potential biases in their recommendations Restrictions on Personal Trading by Analysts by preventing the analyst from trading around the time they issue their reports the conflict arising from their personal financial interests should be reduced. Disclosures of Financial Interests in Covered Companies analysts must disclose if they own shares of recommended companies. The firm must also disclose if they own more than 1% of the companies equity. Disclosure in Research Reports Regarding the Firms Ratings they must clearly explain in the research reports the meaning of all ratings terms they use. This will assist the investor in deciding what value to place on the securities. Disclosures During Public Appearances by Analysts when on television or radio or other media forms, analysts must disclose if they or their firm have a position in the stock, if the company is an investment banking client of the firm and other material conflicts.

The rules above will be put into place over the next year and if successful, they may help regain the confidence of the investors that have been let down in the past.

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Conclusion I think that it is fair to say that the reputation of the business world and the investment community have been severely tarnished over the last few years and there is a lot of work that must be done in order to correct this. With the help of new rules and regulations investment firms can begin to rebuild this trust with investors. I believe however, not all of these changes will be in everyones best interest. Take the private firm wishing to go public for example. The analyst was a very valuable asset to these companies as their exposure to the investment world depended on them. They got the names of these companies out into the papers and in the media. With the regulations in place the small companies are going to get very little help and will have little exposure because the analyst will have no interest or incentive in pushing the stock. Even though a lot of the research that analysts did on these small companies wasnt exactly independent and objective research, it was still research and it gave the small company a name. This will no longer happen under the new rules. Another issue is that everybody is putting all of the blame on the analyst. I think that the analysts and the investment banking departments should take the majority of the blame, but there is someone else that should also take part of the blame and that is the media. During good times they push the same stocks that the analysts do and publish articles about them giving them full exposure. They often fail to do their own research on the companies that they are publishing and in the end they are just as wrong as the analysts and are in fact helping them help the investment bankers get new deals. When the economy turn sour, they are the first to criticize these analysts. So I think that the media should take some responsibility. It will be interesting to see what will come next in this fiasco and what rules we will have to play by as we enter into the job markets. Will analysts regain their independence and objectivity? As long there is more money to be made and lucrative deals around every corner I dont know if we will every see a squeaky clean Wall Street.

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Bibliography 1. (2002, April 29). Trying to Build a Wall on Wall Street: Will Investment Bankers Have to Keep Their Analysts Separate? Business Week. [Online]. 2. What Analysts and Investors Want. Investor Relations Magazine. Guide no. 6. Sponsored by Association for Investment Management and Research (A.I.M.R.). Bruce, B.R. (2002, October). The Analyst Conflict of Interest. PanAgora Asset Management. [Online]. Available: HTTP: http://www.panagora.com/index.asp?mode=intl_eq [2003, January 20]. Bruce, B.R. (2002, September). The Analyst Cycle. PanAgora Asset Management. [Online]. Available: HTTP: http://www.panagora.com/index.asp?mode=intl_eq [2003, January 20]. Bruce, B.R. (2002, May). The Role of Analysts. PanAgora Asset Management. [Online]. Available: HTTP: http://www.panagora.com/index.asp?mode=intl_eq [2003, January 20]. Borrus, A., McNamee, M. (2002, October 7). Commentary: How Bankers and Brokers Could Get Bruised. Business Week [Online]. Coffee Jr., J. (2001, August 23). The Conflict-of-Interest Minefield. Business Week [Online]. Coursey, D. (2002, April 17). Was Merrill Lynch Full of Bull? Looks That Way. ZDNet. [Online]. Available: HTTP: http://www.zdnet.com/anchordesk/stories/story/0,10738,2861582-,00.html [2003, January 22]. Dunn, B. (2000). What in the World is a Buy-Side/Sell-Side Analyst? [Online]. Available: HTTP: http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/investing/20000126k.asp [2003, January 22]. Foerster, S. (2001, December). Do Analysts Have a Conflict of Interest? R.O.B. Magazine, p.83. Gimein, M. (2002, September 16). Eliot Spitzer The Enforcer. Fortune. pp. 77-84. Kahn, J. (2002, October 28). Splitting Up the Street. Fortune. p. 31.

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Mann, B. (2002, April 19). How Do Analysts Sleep? The Motley Fool [Online]. Available: HTTP: http://www.fool.com/server/foolprint.asp? file=/news/foth/2002-/foth020419.htm [2003, January 22]. Michaely, R., Womack, K. L. (1999). Conflict of Interest and the Credibility of Underwriter Analyst Recommendations. The Review of Financial Studies. Vol.12. No.4. pp.653-686. Nichols, C. (2002, May 31). Pitt Says Analyst Probes Rising. TheStreet.com [Online]. Available: HTTP: http://www.thestreet.com/markets/marketfeatures/10025084.html [2003, January 21]. Standards of Practice Handbook: The Code of Ethics and The Standards or Professional Conduct. (8th ed.). (1999). Association for Investment Management and Research. Todd, S., & Todd, J. (Producers). (2000). Boiler Room. [Film]. New Line Cinema.

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