Browse > Home / Business / Let’s Be Cynical: Can One Man Steal $65 Billion?

Let’s Be Cynical: Can One Man Steal $65 Billion?

February 3, 2010

R.F.Wilson writes: Lock up your savings, people. And your daughters as well – just in case. Hide that cash under your mattresses or, best of all, wrap it up in thick plastic and bury it in your garden. Bernie Madoff’s boys have gotten away with it and are on the look-out for more mugs who’d be ready to invest into their Ponzy schemes.

Why all the fuss, you may ask. Well, let me enlighten you: the Serious Fraud Office, that’s a bunch of accountants, if you didn’t know it, have announced yesterday that it would not pursue legal action against Bernie’s British based operations. BM, as he is known among his close friends, is now doing 150 years for stealing $65 billion. Rumours reach me that he has already managed to launch an investment scheme in jail, and it has collapsed, leaving all the inmates out of pocket. What a man! And what a feel for other people’s money. Gordon Brown should have a tattoo inscribed of his image on his chest.

So that you know, the SFO has said that it couldn’t find ‘insufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction’ against either the company, Madoff Securities International Ltd, or its stuff that consisted of 28 extremely talented individuals half of whom were traders. And that, I hasten to add, despite the fact that last year the SFO boys said that MSI was playing a crucial part in the whole Ponzi scheme.

But enough of this nonsense. Let me ask you this: can one man steal $65 billion? Come on, think about it. Roll that figure in your mouth, drool on it, imagine all the zeros that follow the two digits.

And the answer would be ‘no’! No one can steal that much money, all by himself. No chance, not even half a chance. Of course it was a team effort. Big names must have been involved, regulators were obviously paid off, senior bankers must have been sharing the illegal proceeds. I would even go as far as saying that some members of government must have been aware of what was happening, but looked the other way.

The funniest thing of all how everyone rushed to believe good old Bernie that he had pulled it off all by his little old self. No questions were asked. Very decent it was of him. Very honest, in a kinky sort of way.

I remembers one investigator telling me that once you steal over a million, be it dollars or euros or even pound sterling, you run a big risk of getting noticed. And that was a man who spent many years tracking down fraudsters and swindlers and con-artists. He also told me that it took a sophisticated network of bank accounts to move the stolen money between them to avoid detection. He did mention though that such things as client accounts in legal companies did help to hide large amounts of money but he was still adamant that once you would be steling millions it would be pretty hard to hide them.

In Bernie’s case, we’re talking about $65 billion. OK, the amount was spread between several years, but it has come to light that he had actually invested – in a proper sense, that is – only something like half a billion and the rest of the money  just went walkies.

Let me tell you what I think really happened: Bernie was, of course, working with many other people, serious people with connections. Maybe even senior politicians and top bankers and big shot lawyers. And these people have decided when he was caught out – by chance, by the way, all because of the financial meltdown – that he should take the blame for everything.

Look, Bernie, they said to him, why don’t you take the rap for the whole thing? It will look great on your CV and you will help many good people from having to explain some of the honest mistakes they have made in the past. Not to mention that your family will not have to suffer. And we promise to look after you when you spend your time in the slammer. You won’t even notice the difference between your penthouse and your new place of residence.

And Madoff had agreed. And took the rap. For all of the $65 billion. And I bet you he probably even feels a certain sense of satisfaction now. Because it’s not like he going down for some miserly hundred grand, or even a mil. He is going down in style and with a bang, so to speak. And he is expecting to be looked after well.

I wonder if he would not be tempted to confess to stealing even more money. Say, $500 billion? Compliments of some other group of serious people? And why doesn’t he actually claim to have brought down the whole US economy? The possibilities are endless here.

Bernie should also consider taking the rap for the whole world crisis. Would save so many people all that hassle of proving that they never touched a cent of other people’s money.

– End –

Related posts:

  1. The Question Still Stands: Can One Man Steal $65 Billion?

    Adam Lovejoy writes: Well wouldn’t you know it: big Bernie Madoff, who’s doing life in a US prison for singlehandedly stealing $65 billion in a...

  2. Let’s Be Cynical About $65 Billion Going Missing

    Bernie Maddof, who is serving 150 years in the slammer, has been talked about in recent days a lot. Some people even call him...

  3. How To Steal A Trillion From The Public Purse? A Cynical Look At Britain

    Anton Goryunov writes from Moscow: Well, well, well. Let me tell you, people, who live in a supposedly democratic Britain, that here in Russia...

  4. RBS Announces Record Losses Of £24.1 Billion. Well Done, RBS! A Record Is Still A Record

    Adam Lovejoy writes: Today we salute the Royal Bank of Scotland that has posted a record loss in British corporate history of £24.1 billion...

Category: Business  · No Comments »
Tags: ,

Would you like to add a comment?