Deal Professor: Goldman, on Both Sides of a Deal, Is Now in Court

FORTUNE -- Disclosure failures related to mortgage offerings are again in the sights of the SEC, this time related to Goldman Sachs (GS) and Wells Fargo (WFC). And a recent court order describes potential client conflicts of interest involving advice provided by Morgan Stanley (MS) and Goldman Sachs (with the apparent knowledge and participation of CEO Lloyd Blankfein) related to the Kinder Morgan-El Paso acquisition. Are these and other large financial firms just too big to behave? "These firms are enormous ...

Delaware's top business-court judge slammed Goldman Sachs and El Paso's CEO for their handling of a sale agreement for El Paso last year, but declined to stop the sale to Kinder Morgan from moving forward.

By Morningstar: By Jason Stevens

By Tim Plaehn: With the April 25, 2012 closing of the acquisition of El Paso Corporation by Kinder Morgan Inc.

By Tim Plaehn: Last week, on March 1, a judge from the Delaware Court of the Chancery declined to halt the $38 billion acquisition of El Paso Corp. (EP) by Kinder Morgan (KMI).

Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP, the biggest U.S. pipeline company, said fourth-quarter profit rose as it shipped more gas in its interstate pipelines and expanded its network. Net income increased to US$614-million from US$475-million in the same quarter of 2011, Houston-based Kinder Morgan said in a statement today. After payments to Kinder Morgan Inc., its parent company, Kinder Morgan earned 64 cents per unit, 13 cents more than a year ago.

By Todd Johnson: Kinder Morgan, Inc. (KMI) continues to deliver results for dividend income investors. The entire Kinder Morgan collection of publicly traded companies is the 4th largest energy company in North America. Kinder Morgan is the largest general partner in the master limited partnership space. The vast energy complex has an enterprise value of over $100 billion.

By SteinwayCapital:At the expense of squaring off with the traditional guild of merger arbitrageurs, I will elaborate in this piece my personal view of how I think a strategic transaction such as El Paso (EP) / Kinder Morgan Inc (KMI) (OTCBB: KMI-WT-WI, KMI/WS-W) should be "played".