Madoff represents "Wall Street"s general tone. (Traders excluded.) Banks, Brokers, Money Guys, all took Greed to the limit. IMHO, Greed is good, I play on Greed with my clients. However, Greed must be accompanied by Honesty. Greed without morals will destroy "Wall Street"'s image and Investors confidence. I deal with very wealthy guys, these guys are buying multiple shares @ 100k each to get into one of the riskest ventures in our country. I have taken away more money from "Stock Brokers" and Fund Managers in the recent 6 months than ever. I use to get the objection, "I have a broker who handels my money". No longer a objection. My clients are disgusted with "Wall Street". These guys are not young guys I deal with. The average age is between 55 and 80. These guys have been around the block. But the one block they are not going to is Wall Street.
I hear ya. I'm in the business and I feel that I can not/dare not trust anymore either. A sorry state we're in.
You can work out "normal worst day of the year" exposure by using an abacus. This leaves no real role for VAR - it is worse than useless for tail events (because it gives noobs a false sense of security), and it is no better than an abacus for normal events.
Really? Consider how often a horror film director thinks about how someone would be tortured to death, or a crime novelist thinks about how to pull off the perfect murder, or how to wipe out a rival mafia family. It's called using your imagination. By your logic, this means horror film directors and crime novelists are disturbed individuals, they are questionable because they have imagined these things. What kind of 1984 thought police BS is this? All normal people are aware there is a chance at some point in life they might become mentally ill e.g. paranoid schizophrenic, or suffering serious clinical depression. In that case, there is a not-insignificant chance they would kill themselves. Thus, all normal people can imagine a scenario where they would kill themselves. You're wrong.
Ever wonder what someone who is accused of a multi-billion fraud does to pass away the hours of home detention? Wonder no more... <img src=http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/attachment.php?s=&postid=2230484> He looks pretty comfy in his "detention center" doesn't he? I'm sure he is hoping for a REALLY long investigation and trial. http://www.newyorksocialdiary.com/node/145339
Here is a shot of his prison during the day. Not bad, beats the Metropolitan Correctional Center... <img src=http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/attachment.php?s=&postid=2230494>
Does anyone think that any of his investors already had recovered their original investment with Madoff through withdrawals over the years? It could be possible that maybe some of his favorite friends who may have invested let say a million dollars 20 years ago had taken out a million and what was left was the house money which was phantom money. It also could be possible that a select few could recover their losses through tax refunds or sipc. Perhaps the real losers were faceless institutional investors. If one looked at this as a mlm, some at the top may have recovered their original investment.
too right and it doesn't end there either who pays the bills when they are in prison ? the taxpayers again !! ( what a surprise )
In his blog, Erik Kolodny wrote about the scenario if SIPC paid out to investors. The SIPC has 1.6 billion I think. This could clean it out.