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  #31  
Old 12-19-2008, 10:15 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Botnst View Post
It wuz duh Joos.
I guess this is one time where "duh Joos" got bit in the butt by their own clannishness.

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  #32  
Old 12-19-2008, 10:30 AM
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Steven Speilberg, Frank Lautenberg, et als. These are smart guys. They must have wondered how this guy was generating the returns he claimed and his "auditors" certified.

I guess they must have thought he was the smartest guy on the planet. Smarter than anyone else? Year after year? You think they all thought that?

I guess they never heard of Enron or WorldCom or any of the other fraudulent audited financials foisted on the gullible investor.

OR...........

Maybe they wondered how he was doing it, but as long as they were winners, don't ask don't tell.
IOW: FTW as long as I'm getting mine, I don't care if it's legit or not.

Fear not, help os on the way. More regulation to come.

Obama Keen to Regulate Finance
By JONATHAN WEISMAN
President-elect Barack Obama said Thursday that remaking the nation's financial regulatory system will be one of his first initiatives, and he pledged to streamline authority, consolidate agencies and spread financial oversight far beyond the banking system.

New regulations are likely to fall on financial institutions currently seeking federal assistance that are either lightly regulated or not regulated at all, Obama aides said. Mortgage brokers are under particular scrutiny, as are hedge funds and private-equity firms.

Mr. Obama, who introduced his financial-regulatory team Thursday, hinted at consolidating the hodgepodge of financial regulators, including the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. One focus will be revamping the system so that financial firms can no longer shop around for regulatory agencies that offer the lightest possible touch, an Obama aide said.

Mr. Obama will also have an immediate opportunity to remake the Federal Reserve with three appointments to the reserve board.

"The need to potentially consolidate some of the regulatory agencies that are out there, to streamline them, to make clear who's got what mission so that things aren't falling through the cracks -- those are all going to be part of the review that we do over the next several weeks," Mr. Obama said.

Obama aides said they hope to have the beginnings of a new regulatory regime ready to present April 2, when the Group of 20 nations convenes in London.

At a news conference in Chicago, Mr. Obama introduced his choice to lead the SEC, Mary Schapiro; his pick for the CFTC, Gary Gensler; and a new member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, Daniel Tarullo, one of the three to be named, calling them tough, common-sense regulators.

"We have been asleep at the switch, not just some of the regulatory agencies, but some of the congressional committees that might have been taking a look at this stuff," Mr. Obama told reporters in Chicago. "We have not been as aggressive, and we've had a White House that started with the premise that deregulation was always good. And so, what I said during the campaign, I meant. We are going to have to greatly strengthen our regulatory apparatus."
Mr. Obama will take office amid a multiheaded economic crisis. He already has planned a giant fiscal stimulus plan to pump money into the economy, and could quickly have to tackle the future of the auto industry and the Bush administration's financial bailout.

"The next few months are an unprecedented moment of opportunity both to respond to the current crisis and to put a foundation in place for a more prosperous, more stable and more inclusive economy," said Lawrence Summers, who will direct Mr. Obama's National Economic Council. "If there seems to be a lot of ambition, the ambition reflects the nature of the moment."

Mr. Obama's team generally won praise from industry officials and lawmakers who will help finalize any regulatory legislation. Scott Talbott, senior vice president for government affairs at the Financial Services Roundtable, called the team pragmatic, saying they combined education, experience and "an intimate knowledge of the current financial-services regulatory structure."

Micah Green, a Patton Boggs attorney and former head of the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, a trade group, said the timing of the announcement -- before the president-elect's cabinet is complete -- was "extraordinary." He added, "It speaks to the priority of the issue." Mr. Green said their focus will likely be on establishing a new regulatory framework to watch over the flow of money.......................

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122965186108420649.html
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  #33  
Old 12-19-2008, 03:57 PM
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As of now, I will be awarding the great LA Rondo Baloney Award, to any of the lip-service providers.
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  #34  
Old 12-19-2008, 06:38 PM
t walgamuth's Avatar
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Botnst View Post
Oh wow. Now there's another distinction without a difference.

What do you call a person who is sworn to enforce the law, "Tooth fairy"?
Bank regulators.

But you are welcome to call them tooth fairies if you like.
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  #35  
Old 12-19-2008, 07:10 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by t walgamuth View Post
Bank regulators.

But you are welcome to call them tooth fairies if you like.
Bank regulators arrest people?
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  #36  
Old 12-19-2008, 08:18 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Botnst View Post
...
What do you call a person who is sworn to enforce the law, "Tooth fairy"?
"Toothless Fairies" would make a more desciptive pronouncation, for those representing regulative offices, while letting criminals slide on a continuous basis.
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  #37  
Old 12-19-2008, 09:59 PM
t walgamuth's Avatar
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Howitzer View Post
Bank regulators arrest people?
You don't know the answer to this question?
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  #38  
Old 12-20-2008, 02:42 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Botnst View Post
We need more cops, more prosecutor and more jails. That will solve the problem, right?
Imagine we had no one overseeing huge money managers. That would work? From what I read, regulators are overwhelmed. Maybe a few more would be cost effective.

IOW, if we can agree that fewer "cops" will likely not work, why would we insist that more will also not work?
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  #39  
Old 12-20-2008, 02:46 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mgburg View Post
If I may parrot Bot...

"It was Bush's fault."

Just put your head back in the sand. We'll wake you if anything happens.
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  #40  
Old 12-20-2008, 07:49 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Botnst View Post
A fraud, a cheat, a liar, a crook. A creep who took advantage of people. He "worked" in a somewhat free market and preyed on others.

He should have done like Rom Emmanual, Chris Dodd, and Barney Franks did for their pals and merely give the taxpayers' future earnings to incompetent quasi-governmental entities to be disbursed to their cronies.
Yeah, what that guy said. Proper punishment would be to chain Madoff to a pole in the Middle of Wall Street and let people who worked hard and went broke have 5 minutes with him.....
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  #41  
Old 12-20-2008, 04:17 PM
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Originally Posted by Mistress View Post
Yeah, what that guy said. Proper punishment would be to chain Madoff to a pole in the Middle of Wall Street and let people who worked hard and went broke have 5 minutes with him.....
You got some real good ideas. I think, Madam M would be a proper honorary title for you.

The problem is though, we'd have to make a lot of room for an awful lot of poles along Wall Street. But, it's doable
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  #42  
Old 12-21-2008, 10:32 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cmac2012 View Post
Imagine we had no one overseeing huge money managers. That would work? From what I read, regulators are overwhelmed. Maybe a few more would be cost effective.

IOW, if we can agree that fewer "cops" will likely not work, why would we insist that more will also not work?
It is interesting to me that whenever the government proves to be a dismal failure at something the solution is always to have more of it - there was not enough. If you actually go through this case it is obvious that there was no shortage of regulation, regulators, or oversight. The problem is that the regulators and overseers were ineffective. The "government" is not some magical power that is capable of feats normal human beings cannot achieve.

I don't believe that increasing regulation will do anything to prevent something like from happening again. In fact, too many investors let their guard down because they believe they are protected by their government, in the same way the people of New Orleans thought they were protected by their govenment built and maintained the levies.

Most of the money that was lost would never have been given to Madoff had most of the investors done even the most basic inspection of his operations. In fact, there are several large institutions that either walked away, or in some cased, blew the wistle on him after their findings made them skeptical his operations were legitimate.

As someone who has spend a good part of their career selecting money managers for clients I can tell you it is very easy to walk away from them. I have had interviews with hedge fund managers where I have asked them point blank what kind of protections were in place to prevent them from taking my client's money and heading offshore. To their credit, a few of them were honest and told me nothing would stop them. I still didn't place any client funds with them. There were so many obvious red flags with this operation that I can not imagine a case where a true professional would have placed a significant amount of any client's funds with Madoff. Most of the stories you hear are of entire charities being taken down becuase he has all of their money - similar stories for individiuals. I can't see how any one in their right mind would put so much of their capital under one strategy or manager. They must have been blinded by either greed, personal connections or the stories of this fellow. None of these things is an excuse for losing money.

In addition to punishing the culprit, if you really want to prevent something like from happening again, what has to happen is that people need to see they can not invest blindly and reap huge rewards. They need to see that some investment advisors are incompetent or that their objectivity has been compromised. Investment advisor who can not prove they completed thorough due-dilligence should be sued. Those who did due-dilligence but place large proportions of their client's funds with Madoff claiming they were mislead should also be sued for voilating anything from the prudent investor standard to basic common sense.
This will probably put some of them out of business - hopefully most of them.

There were plenty of resources, proceedures and policies in place to have prevented this. Most of them were unused.
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  #43  
Old 12-21-2008, 10:53 AM
t walgamuth's Avatar
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Originally Posted by 420SEL View Post
It is interesting to me that whenever the government proves to be a dismal failure at something the solution is always to have more of it - there was not enough. If you actually go through this case it is obvious that there was no shortage of regulation, regulators, or oversight. The problem is that the regulators and overseers were ineffective. The "government" is not some magical power that is capable of feats normal human beings cannot achieve.

I don't believe that increasing regulation will do anything to prevent something like from happening again. In fact, too many investors let their guard down because they believe they are protected by their government, in the same way the people of New Orleans thought they were protected by their govenment built and maintained the levies.

Most of the money that was lost would never have been given to Madoff had most of the investors done even the most basic inspection of his operations. In fact, there are several large institutions that either walked away, or in some cased, blew the wistle on him after their findings made them skeptical his operations were legitimate.

As someone who has spend a good part of their career selecting money managers for clients I can tell you it is very easy to walk away from them. I have had interviews with hedge fund managers where I have asked them point blank what kind of protections were in place to prevent them from taking my client's money and heading offshore. To their credit, a few of them were honest and told me nothing would stop them. I still didn't place any client funds with them. There were so many obvious red flags with this operation that I can not imagine a case where a true professional would have placed a significant amount of any client's funds with Madoff. Most of the stories you hear are of entire charities being taken down becuase he has all of their money - similar stories for individiuals. I can't see how any one in their right mind would put so much of their capital under one strategy or manager. They must have been blinded by either greed, personal connections or the stories of this fellow. None of these things is an excuse for losing money.

In addition to punishing the culprit, if you really want to prevent something like from happening again, what has to happen is that people need to see they can not invest blindly and reap huge rewards. They need to see that some investment advisors are incompetent or that their objectivity has been compromised. Investment advisor who can not prove they completed thorough due-dilligence should be sued. Those who did due-dilligence but place large proportions of their client's funds with Madoff claiming they were mislead should also be sued for voilating anything from the prudent investor standard to basic common sense.
This will probably put some of them out of business - hopefully most of them.

There were plenty of resources, proceedures and policies in place to have prevented this. Most of them were unused.
I disagree.

It is my understanding that funding for regulatory activities have been cut and cut some more. No funding equals no accomplshments. YOu can cripple the activities of a regulatory agency without taking the political flack for abolishing the agency.
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  #44  
Old 12-21-2008, 11:34 AM
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Take a look at this and tell me if they say anything about their funding being cut and that they are losing the ability to properly regulate financial markets.

http://www.sec.gov/about/whatwedo.shtml

The funding cut argument, even if true, does not change the heart of my argument, which is that this mess could have been avoided without any increase in regulation or funding to regulators had any of the participants taken a moment to think that there would not be some almightly government to bail them out. Madoff would surely still have gotten some money, but nothing close to what he has.
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  #45  
Old 12-21-2008, 01:46 PM
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...."taken a moment to think".....

Ahh, there's the rub.

Investing is child's play. No wait, make that infant's play if you believe e-Trade's infant commercials!

No one wants to think. No one wants to believe even the simplest maxims such as...

"If is sounds too good to be true, it probably isn't."
or
"No risk, no reward."

" A fool and his money........."

Then there's the saying about a man with money meeting a man with experience.

Posting above average returns for years while claiming little risk to investors, Madoff and others before him, made fortunes playing to man's greed and stupidity.

Tom, you seem to be a practical, down to earth sort. Would you give this guy any or all of your fortune to invest? Without asking questions or performing due diligence? Or do you think the investor should be free to invest like the baby in the tube.
No need to worry about risk. Somebody will be watching out for you to make everything allright.

I've seen a recent etrade commercial where the baby vomits at the end. ...like many investors have been doing recently. Appropos?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdfvWAp5GUw

Non profits that have been wiped out through no fault of their own have my sympathy. If you invest with Mr A, who then flipped it to Madoff without oyur knowledge, you have every reason to holler.

If you were in with the wealth crowd, Steven Speilberg for instance, and knew where your money was and who was handling it, I ddon't have much sympathy, either for your greed or stupidity.

If prostitution is the oldest profession, theft and fraud must be number two.
That reminds me of an article I read this week, which I will post.

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