There seems to be as much noise surrounding the AIG debachle as there was when the 10 major brokerage firms had to pay a $1.4 billion dollar fine for lying and defrauding investors. Eliot (Ness) Spitzer let the cat out of the bag when he said that criminal charges have been ruled out, and a "civil resolution with the corporation will ultimately be achievable".
We knew this. Spitzer stopped short of (really) punishing Wall Street brokerage firms for cheating investors, what makes us think he is going to do anything different with AIG.
The real joke in the whole AIG debachle is former CEO Hank Greenberg poising as a benevolent soul at a soup kitchen for the poor. Of course Hank (or should we call him "Hankie Pankie") wasn't getting his hands dirty serving the needy. The entire benevolent act was the idea of the media-savvy superlawyer David Boies who was recently retained by Greenberg.
In a few months the AIG news will disappear like like brokerage firm scandals. Most of the major brokerage stocks have delivered nice returns since the $1.4 billion dollar settlement. I see no reason why AIG will not do the same.
