Monday morning Bernie Madoff received a 150-year sentence for operating an estimated $65 billion Ponzi scheme, the maximum sentence he could have received from the U.S District Court. Hundreds of scathing comments are flowing into blogs and other news venues spewing venom at Madoff for his incredible crime.
We would like to see some of this anger reserved for the agencies whose job it was to regulate Madoff.
Congressional hearings on the Madoff scandal are continuing today and at one point, this is what was reported (New York Times Dealbook):
1:18 p.m. | An “annoyed” congressman: Mr. Kanjorski signals that he doesn’t want to hear that the S.E.C. can’t discuss the ongoing Madoff investigation. He notes that the lack of cooperation by the S.E.C. over the last several weeks is “unacceptable” and he threatens to shut down the agency if they don’t start cooperating. Mr Kanjorski says one of the officials asked to testify said he was exempt, prompting the congressman to call the head of the S.E.C. because he was so “annoyed.” He called the opening statements “oatmeal.”
While looking for information on a certain money manager I came across a Website that put together a list of all of the institutional and individual investors who had lost money with Bernard Madoff. The list is impressive in its size and scope.
I was looking at another list as well in my due diligence for Futures’ upcoming Top Traders of the year feature. You see, while 2008 was a terrible year for equities, hedge funds, housing and just about every other asset class, commodity trading advisors (CTAs) had one their best year’s ever. Those of you who are familiar with managed futures know that it tends to perform best when equity markets struggle and when there are large market dislocations causing increased volatility.
