FINRA

FINRA is the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority. They are the watchdogs of the securities business now. Their claim is that they need to separate hazards of investing from opportunity. Check them out at finra.org.

What they really need to do is get it right in 2007. The farcity of the inability of the average American investor to go to a governmental regulatory web site and look at the backgrounds of retail stock brokers is truly laughable. If they wanted the fox to stop guarding the hen house and allow investors to figure out what kind of person/broker they are or will be dealing with would be a real first step.

In the 1980's when I worked at Drexel Burnham Lambert in LaJolla, CA we had a trio of brokers in a certain part of the office whose offices all adjoined each other.

We called that part of the office "murderer's row".

If they want investor confidence they need full transparency.

Now.