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Madoff - "Made off" with $50bn

The link is to a list of organisations (people) who have lost in the Madoff Ponzi Scheme.

There is an important principle to remember in financial services (and life generally) which is that if something is "too good to be true", then most likely it either isn't good or it isn't true.

This was one that wasn't true.

I am surprised that this was not picked up by the SEC, however.

This one will reverberate a bit. Some of the people who have sent money his way have then benefited by also reporting high returns - that are not real returns.

Comments

Martin said…
The problem I have with this John is understanding it. Madoff has profited to the tune of $50,000,000,000 - what do you do with a sum like that. It has to be somewhere either in cash or tangible assets. Surely it was all used in robbing Peter to pay Paul. In which case the regulators should be demanding the unwarrented and unearned returns back from Paul to repay Peter!
9:10 am
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