Given the sexual politics on Wall Street, a lot of men in positions of authority "get the girl to do it" when it comes to something that seems a tad dicey from a compliance or regulatory perspective. Later on, when whatever the girl did blows up and the regulators come a knockin', well the old boys' playbook tends to call the same audible. The girl was never told to do that. The girl acted on her own. No one knew. She went rogue. Of course, FINRA is too eager to buy into that crap, and the industry's women and minorities pay a disproportionate price for their relatively low-level infractions. Consider a recent FINRA regulatory settlement with another of the industry's female employees.
You ever read something and you think that you understand what happened but when you go back and re-read the same document, you realize that you assumed a lot of stuff that wasn't in there and, geez, the more I read this thing, the less confidence that I have with what I'm being told happened because I don't think that what they meant is what they said, but if that's the case, then I don't think that they said what they meant, but if they did, I'm not quite sure that it makes sense but for the fact that I still think that I intuit what went on here even if I can't actually explain it. And thus we begin the tale of a recent public customer's FINRA Arbitration.
BofA/Merrill Lynch alleged that it discharged an analyst for using his corporate credit card at a so-called adult entertainment venue. They also sold steak there, in case you were wondering. The thing about FINRA's regulator case is that it sure as hell didn't have much proof. What it did have was four FINRA lawyers going after some poor shlub who must have wished the floor would open up and swallow him.