Matt Levine had a good take on the second point (as always): an underwriter used to lend its name and authority to an IPO as a gatekeeper, back when IPOs were r

Matt Levine had a good take on the second point (as always): an underwriter used to lend its name and authority to an IPO as a gatekeeper, back when IPOs were rarer. Now they will sign onto just about any deal, and while they still do some due diligence, it means very little to investors that Morgan Stanley or UBS is underwriting. “Nobody bought Snap because of Morgan Stanley's imprimatur. In this world, the underwriters are mostly just service providers. Certainly they have due-diligence obligations -- they really aren't supposed to take companies public if their financials are fraudulent -- but they don't have much leverage to insist on things like voting stock or forward-looking earnings guidance. The market decides stuff like that, not the underwriters. The underwriters just shut up and execute.”