The Facebook offering illustrates one of Wall Street’s best-kept secrets: Securities firms are allowed to selectively confer with favored large investing clients about crucial information as they prepare IPOs, while small investors are left out.
Some Big Firms Got Facebook Warning, The Wall Street Journal, 24 May 2012
I mean, what do you think we’re doing out here in the middle of the desert?…It’s all been arranged just for us to get your money. That’s the truth about Las Vegas. We’re the only winners. The players don’t stand a chance.
Ace Rothstein (Robert DeNiro) in Nicholas Pileggi and Martin Scorsese’s Casino (1995)
