Bernie Madoff and the $50 billion swindle

June 29th, 2009 at 05:03pm Linda Grist Cunningham

Bernard Madoff gets to spend the rest of his life in federal prison serving a 150-year sentence for swindling upwards of $13 billion to $50 billion from his investors (depends on who is counting). He gets what he deserves and his wife gets to keep $2.5 million, which for most would be celebration worthy. We could live handsomely on that, couldn’t we?

So, Bernie heads for prison and his investors who might get back a few bucks figure out how to re-build their nest eggs. In today’s Associated Press story, I found this paragraph:

“Before Madoff became a symbol of Wall Street greed, he earned a reputation as a trusted money manager with a Midas touch. Even as the market fluctuated, clients of his secretive investment advisory business - from Florida retirees to celebrities such as Steven Spielberg, actor Kevin Bacon and Hall of Fame pitcher Sandy Koufax - for decades enjoyed steady double-digit returns.“

Please note the words in bold. Read them again. I have just one question for those clients: Were you beyond stupid or just so  greedy you pretended not to notice it was just too good to be true?

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