How'd you like to have to give back money you took out YEARS ago. This is the kind of shit that brings down governments. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&refer=home&sid=a3kFmYaaw5sY
The only ones who win in situations like this are the parasitic lawyers, who are swarming all over this carcass. This is how it works. The lawyers will be successful in clawing back some of the payments made to investors. But guess who gets paid FIRST in bankruptcies?! The lawyers. That includes lawyers who are bankrupcty trustees, lawyers who represent plantiffs, lawyers who represent defendents, etc. After all the lawyer constituencies get paid there'll be little or no funds left for the creditors of Madoff's firm (the real victims in this massive fraud). See how the article says that $20 million of the $33 million recovered in the Bayou fraud case went to legal fees, and the decision was being appealed (which means that EVEN MORE legal fees are eating away at the remaining $13 million). When it's all said and done, nothing will be left for the creditors. Lawyers on both sides will see to that. The whole corporate bankruptcy system is a massive lawyer enrichment scheme, put in place by Congress, which is comprised mostly by lawyers. Allegedly, the bankruptcy code was established to give fair and beneficial treatment to the creditors, but the end results are far, far away from that!
This is no different to going to a shopkeeper and telling him that 5 years ago someone bought goods with stolen bills, so he has to pay it back. The US legal system is batshit crazy.
So what happens if you don't give back this "Clawback" money? Or, you spent it all? I've never heard or read of a man in a Federal Penitentiary for having withdrawn, paid taxes on, and kept investment profits in an investment scheme that, years later,went bad w/out his complicity or knowledge. Have you?
Social Security is the biggest Ponzi scheme ever! Does that mean some day after we start drawing our SS payments that we'll have to give them back also?
they would only pay back any gains that weren't real gains say dividends or interest income. but investors who withdraw will still keep original investment. as for IRS tax on capital gains that weren't real, IRS must refund all tax on it.
if it was really a ponzi scheme, all the money or gains can be traced back. investors were getting 10% gains over the years. most of his clients were institutional long term investors.