69. The Scheme (Bernie Madoff)
A Wall Street tycoon's money management firm is revealed to be the world's largest Ponzi scheme.
Prelude: Samuel Israel III disappears after his hedge fund collapses.
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Original music for Swindled is written and performed by Trevor Howard (Deformr).
Comments (22)
I think this is the very first scam I ever heard of, and it’s what sparked my obsession with them 🤣
What did Dan Marino do to him
Fr!!
Markapoulous' book is something. He manages to come off as a complete jackass even though you're reading it knowing that he's right. He tells stories about things like how he wanted to pay for a boob job for his girlfriend rather than giving her an engagement ring and gives a little rant about why she was nuts to turn that great offer down. Even jackasses are right sometimes, but nothing in his own recounting of events made me think he made himself particularly easy to believe, meanwhile Madoff had been conning people for decades at that point.
He couldn’t break it down into simple terms for the SEC. They just didn’t understand him. He needed to give them a flowchart of steps to do their job for them like go to his office, ask for records of his trades, make some phone calls to verify trades actually happened. You have to make it idiot proof for regulators. Remember, these are the people that could get a job at places like Madoff. The “C” students regulating the “A” students.
Can we get that Madoff laugh as a notification / ringtone sound?
I always find it funny that when a massively rich person says they're broke, they often still have dozens of times more wealth and assets than the average american.
Robin, right! They're "broke" because they can't buy a second Lear jet. They have no clue what it means to be afraid of what might happen if you lose your job because you have only about 3 months' of expenses in your savings account.
Another great podcast!! ACC? Will you marry me? 😂
Conceal the nuts and bolts🤣
I've heard it said the best cheaters are the ones who know the system the best - and consequently the ones you'd least expect to cheat.
This made me think about the Enron scandal! Would love to hear an episode about Enron, WorldCom, or the Dixon, IL scandal where a city employee embezzled 53 MILLION from her town
I think that last one is called The Horse Queen (Rita Crundwell). It's episode 2.
Oh, and another thing: the SEC owes Harry Markopolos a huge public apology for ignoring his investigation.
Harry was unable to break his message down into simple terms. He assumed too much mathematical knowledge and drowned it out in complexity. In the end nobody had the slightest idea what he was saying. He should have taken the communication paper at college instead of all those advanced statistics papers.
Great research as always! I knew you wouldn't touch this without giving it the treatment we're all used to and it did not disappoint. I hadn't realized they had recouped that much of it back. I also didn't realize that he pioneered the digital interface; no wonder he was able to run a "fake" one when clients/SEC wanted to see trades in real-time. I hope Harry didn't submit his evidence in the form of mathematical proofs; no one *actually* reads those but math majors. p.s. The Dan Marino jokes were a great bonus. Excellent intro story YET again.
Was sad to hear that his two sons died early and effectively because of him.
I honestly thought this would be longer or a two-parter given the subject.
Oooh, been waiting for this one
Oh boy this is gonna be a good one
Know what I'm about to do.
Yaaaasss