Network For Investor Action & Protection

Bernie Madoff’s Stuff Is The Star Attraction At A Gangsters And Serial Killers Museum Exhibit

admin — Thu, 23 May 2013 18:07:49 +0000

Shamed US financier Bernie Madoff, serving a 150-year prison sentence, is back in the spotlight as the star of an exhibit in a US museum dedicated to gangsters and serial killers. A baseball bat engraved with the former mogul’s name, a letter in which he seeks forgiveness from his son Andrew and even keys to his old New York office are on display at Washington’s National Museum of Crime & Punishment. In total, some 15 items that once belonged to the famous fraudster or are in some way linked to him, are on view. More on Business Insider here.

SEC charges South Miami with fraud over debt deals

admin — Thu, 23 May 2013 18:06:28 +0000

The city of South Miami, Florida, defrauded investors by not disclosing problems with the tax-exempt status of two bond deals, U.S. securities regulators said on Wednesday in their second municipal bond fraud-enforcement action this month. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said the city agreed to settle the fraud charges and retain an independent consultant to oversee its municipal bond disclosures. The city settled without admitting or denying the SEC allegations. South Miami’s city manager was not immediately available to comment. The two deals at issue, so-called conduit bonds that were used to finance a mixed-use retail and parking structure, totaled $12 million and were made through the Florida Municipal Loan Council. More on Reuters here.

Fallen Goldman Director Appeals for a New Trial

admin — Thu, 23 May 2013 13:07:04 +0000

It was perhaps the most critical piece of evidence in the trial of Rajat K. Gupta, a former Goldman Sachs director found guilty last year of leaking the bank’s boardroom discussions to his hedge fund friend. “I heard yesterday from somebody who’s on the board of Goldman Sachs that they are going to lose $2 per share,” his friend, the money manager Raj Rajaratnam, told a colleague during an October 2008 conversation that federal investigators secretly recorded. On Tuesday, a lawyer for Mr. Gupta argued that a federal appeals court should overturn his client’s conviction and grant a new trial because the verdict was tainted by the erroneous admission of that statement and other wiretapped conversations. “The wiretaps should never have been admitted,” said Mr. Gupta’s lawyer, Seth P. Waxman, during the argument at the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Manhattan. More in the New York Times here.

ICE Joins CME Warning of Splits in Global Derivatives Rules

admin — Thu, 23 May 2013 13:01:31 +0000

Top executives of the two largest U.S. derivatives exchanges say regulators must take further steps to align Dodd-Frank Act rules with those of foreign counterparts to avoid oversight splits that could harm markets. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission and overseas agencies have a few months to improve coordination before differences hurt business, IntercontinentalExchange Inc. (ICE) Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Sprecher said in remarks for a House Agriculture Committee hearing where he will testify alongside CME Group (CME) Inc. Executive Chairman Terry Duffy. “Global financial reform efforts are not being harmonized and substantial differences remain between regulatory regimes,” Sprecher said in comments prepared for today’s hearing in Washington. “It is crucial to understand that if countries erect these barriers, we markets and market participants will be damaged.” More on Bloomberg here.

MF Global trustee liquidates broker’s CME Group memberships

admin — Thu, 23 May 2013 13:00:10 +0000

The trustee liquidating MF Global has sold a collection of the bankrupt broker’s CME Group memberships for amounts below recent selling prices, according to a list of transactions published by the exchange on Monday. Eighteen months after MF Global collapsed, Trustee James Giddens last week sold a variety of memberships owned by the firm that bestow different trading rights on the holders. The firm, which was among the top brokers at CME Group’s exchanges, made a $6.3 billion bet on European sovereign debt and went bankrupt after dipping into customer accounts to try to meet margin calls, in violation of industry rules. More on Reuters here.

Stockholder Power Faces Test at JPMorgan

admin — Mon, 20 May 2013 18:11:12 +0000

Jamie Dimon and the 10 other directors of JPMorgan Chase take the stage in Tampa, Fla., on Tuesday, to face shareholders who can take comfort in a rising stock price and a prospering bank. But those same shareholders may also deliver a humbling rebuff to Mr. Dimon and the bank’s board. If shareholders vote to separate the jobs of chairman and chief executive — positions that Mr. Dimon has held since 2006 — it would signal a shift in the balance of power in corporate America, an inflection point in shareholders’ push for greater say in the boardroom. Shareholder protests at large companies are usually successful only at those that are troubled or whose stock price has disappointed. More in the New York Times here.

Bernie Madoff tormented by son’s suicide

admin — Mon, 20 May 2013 18:10:01 +0000

The Ponzi monster is now tormented by his own demons. In an interview from prison, Bernie Madoff said he’ll be forever haunted by the suicide of his oldest son, and he can’t sleep at night because he blames himself for the 2010 tragedy. “I was responsible for my son Mark’s death, and that’s very, very difficult,” he told CNNMoney in a telephone interview published online yesterday. “I live with that. I live with the remorse, the pain I caused everybody, certainly my family, and the victims.” Mark Madoff, 46, hanged himself with a dog leash inside his Soho apartment on the second anniversary of his disgraced dad’s arrest. More in the New York Post here.

Prison exclusive: Bernie Madoff can’t sleep

admin — Mon, 20 May 2013 18:08:28 +0000

Bernard Madoff once had billions of dollars, but now he makes $40 a month doing menial prison labor. “I used to work as a clerk in the commissary, and now they have me taking care of the telephone and the computer systems,” said Madoff, speaking by phone from a federal prison in North Carolina. His prison phone account didn’t have any money in it, so he had to call CNNMoney collect. As far as the computers and phones go, Madoff said he has to “make sure they’re working and they’re kept clean,” but he emphasizes that this requires no technical skill whatsoever. More on CNNMoney here.

Art Sales Will Boost Stanford Fraud Victims’ Recovery

admin — Thu, 16 May 2013 19:20:14 +0000

A Dale Chihuly chandelier that once belonged to convicted Ponzi-scheme operator R. Allen Stanford will go on the auction block next week. The approximately 7-foot-tall cobalt chandelier, made of hand-blown glass and steel, is valued at between $60,000 and $80,000. The proceeds raised from the chandelier’s sale at a May 22 public auction will eventually make their way to the pockets of Stanford’s cheated investors, who are relying upon a court-appointed receiver to track down their stolen funds. The receiver also is putting a Terence Main sculpture up for sale at the same auction. The 10-piece, 42-foot-long piece is called “Terrestial Tale” and has an estimated value of $20,000 to $30,000. More in the Wall Street Journal here.

SEC says new settlements end ‘Golden Goose’ insider trading case

admin — Thu, 16 May 2013 19:18:53 +0000

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday said it has reached settlements with the last two defendants in an insider trading probe known as the “Golden Goose” case, which had been based on secrets stolen from an executive at a public relations firm. Jamil Bouchareb agreed to pay about $1.05 million and fellow trader Daniel Corbin agreed to pay about $191,000 in disgorged profit plus interest to settle the SEC’s civil cases, after having previously pleaded guilty to related criminal charges. Federal investigators accused the men of making trades based on tips about pending mergers between 2005 and 2008 from Matthew Devlin, a former Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc broker. Investigators said Devlin misappropriated the information by listening to conversations of his wife Nina, an executive at public relations firm Brunswick Group LLC who worked on mergers, and assessing her travel schedule. More on Reuters here.