The Globe and Mail reports in its Wednesday edition Royal Bank of Canada's investment arm in the United States was part of the original syndicate of banks due to bring Alibaba Group Holding's $25-billion (U.S.) initial public offering to market. The Globe's Niall McGee writes, however, it stepped away from the deal less than two weeks beforehand, prompted by careless chatter on a webinar by an RBC executive. John Taft, head of RBC Wealth Management in the U.S., mentioned Alibaba during a panel discussion. In the discussion, Mr. Taft articulated his opposition to a proposal that brokers should be subject to the same fiduciary standard that is currently applied to registered investment advisers. He then used Alibaba's upcoming IPO as a hypothetical example of how technically violating the proposed rule would be in a client's best interest. U.S. federal securities laws around the marketing of IPOs mandate a so-called "quiet period." Companies going public, and the banks underwriting the deals, are supposed to stay silent in the weeks leading up to an offering. The $2.5-million fee RBC missed out on was relatively insignificant; RBC was one of 35 banks on the deal. The bigger concern here is reputational risk.