If these improprieties had taken place at Goldman Sachs or Morgan Stanley, C-level executives would have been frog marched out of their office buildings in handcuffs and a flood of shareholder class action lawsuits would have been filed in state and federal courts across the nation.

FORBES: Is Wall Street Wrong About Con Edison? Probably.

He previously held executive positions at Morgan Stanley Group and Sanford C.

FORBES: This Is Not 1987

The space travel and artificial intelligence of 2001 didn't exactly measure up to Stanley Kubrick's and Arthur C.

ENGADGET: Minority Report at 10: a look at technology from today to 2054

In the financial sector, Bank of America ( BAC), Wells Fargo ( WFC), Citigroup ( C), Morgan Stanley ( MS) and Goldman Sachs ( GS), all reporting positive results.

FORBES: ETF Channel Week In Review: Airlines Soar, Solar Sees Rainy Days

There are tens of thousands of brokers working for brokerage firms like Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley ( MS), Citigroup ( C) and Raymond James ( RJF), and insurance company salespeople at firms like Met Life ( MET), John Hancock and Prudential ( PRU) that earn their living this way.

FORBES: Little Guy Still Ripe For Broker Abuse

Last year, Citadel, Merrill Lynch (nyse: MER - news - people ), UBS (nyse: UBS - news - people ), Credit Suisse Group (nyse: CSR - news - people ), Citigroup (nyse: C - news - people ) and Morgan Stanley (nyse: MS - news - people ) collectively bought up more than 80% of the Philadelphia Stock Exchange and are plowing resources into its electronic trading systems with a goal to route more stock order flow through it.

FORBES: A New Kind Of Exchange

The answer is definitely no, at least when it comes to major financial companies like JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM), Bank of America (NYSE:BAC), Citicorp (NYSE:C), Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS), Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS), Barclays (NYSE:BCS), Deutsche Bank (NYSE:DB), and UBS (NYSE:UBS), for several reasons.

FORBES: 1 Tempting Contrarian Trade

Although Citigroup ( C) and Bank of America ( BAC) sit now just two notches above junk status, Morgan Stanley ( MS) was relieved to see its debt rating cut two notches, not three, reports the Wall Street Journal.

FORBES: Connect