Lazard Capital Markets, which spun off from Lazard, has been charged with failure to supervise three employees who allegedly spent more than $800,000 improperly entertaining traders at Fidelity in an effort to win trading volume. Recall that a few Fidelity employees have already been charged with improperly accepting gifts. In many ways, this is a holdover issue from what now seems to be the distant past. There has been a sea change--notably the rise of commission sharing arrangements--in the way the buyside pays the sellside for execution services. In general, the whole soft-dollar issue has faded. That was quite an era for some buyside traders.

For more:
- here's a Financial News Online article

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