Life goes - very happily thank you

Life goes - very happily thank you - for Wall St.

Some bankers may have teetered a couple of years back, but they are riding high, very high, on Wall St. as 2010 ends and they look to 2011.

"The statistics tell the story: From the outset of 2009 to this past summer, Wall Street banks and other financial players—trade groups, insurance companies, real estate brokerages, and more—spent more than $500 million lobbying Congress on financial reform. That's $1.4 million a day. These firms' main goal: undercutting, if not outright killing, tough new regulations to prevent the next financial crisis."

***

"Now, two years after the greatest financial meltdown in generations, a cataclysm still fresh in the minds of many, you'd think Wall Street would shy away from its high-flying, Ferrari-dealer days.

Quite the opposite. In November, the Times reported on its front page that the lavish party days seemed to be back in fashion. Paired with a video showing Ferraris and Lamborghinis roaring through New York City's financial district, the story described a 1,000-person Halloween party hosted by a Goldman Sachs investment analyst at a swanky Manhattan night club (with rapper Lil' Kim performing) and a Playboy-themed birthday shindig in Hong Kong for the head of Bank of America Asia Pacific. Reservations at posh restaurants were up. So, too, were rentals in the Hamptons. "Two years after the onset of the financial crisis," the Times wrote, "the stock market is recovering and Wall Street's moneyed elite are breathing easier again."

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