Tuesday, December 16, 2008

High finance & misdemeanors

Interesting follow-on to the breaking story on Bernie Madoff, the hedge fund exec who’s lost around $50B (known so far in the US) in what he’s confessed to be an elaborate Ponzi scheme.

The BBC reports that British banks are now whining that their falling for the Madoff come-on to the tune of a couple of billion dollars more of their clients’ money is all down to US failure to regulate hedge funds.

Let me get this straight: you toss your clients’ dough hand over fist into “investments” precisely because they’re high risk/high yield & because you AND your clients are greedy bastards…& it’s somehow the fault of US regulators that it’s all gone pear-shaped?

Evidently the term “due diligence” has no meaning in the world of hedge funds.

I’m not saying the regulators weren’t asleep at the wheel—or at least acting in accordance with current administration policies to turn the high-stakes investment business into the wild west. But this trans-Atlantic finger pointing & pouting is just symptomatic of the problems with the whole corporate world.

Nothing’s wrong; & if there is, I didn’t do it.

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