Bernard Madoff 's Influence On The Great Depression Essay

Introduction: Bernie Madoff was a well-respected financier, his company Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, LLC was very well known and even helped launch the Nasdaq stock market. Madoffs company was well trusted and he even had celebrity cliental such a Steven Spielberg, Kevin bacon, and Kyra Sedgwick. Madoff came from a low income family however, he was able to start his company from getting a $50,000 loan from his in-laws and he using money that he had saved from side jobs such as lifeguarding and installing sprinkler systems to found his company. The successfulness of Madoff’s company came from the company’s ability to adapt to change and us modern day computer technology. As his business grew he stated employing family members to help “His younger brother, Peter, joined him in the business in 1970 and became the firm 's chief compliance officer. Later, Madoff 's sons, Andrew and Mark, also worked for the company as traders. Peter 's daughter, Shana, became a rules-compliance lawyer for the trading division of her uncle 's firm, and his son, Roger, joined the firm before his death in 2006”(Bernard Madoff Biography 2016) Unfortunately on December 11th 2008 Bernie Madoff became well known for a whole new reason. He had been accused of performing an elaborate Ponzi scheme and he had been reported to the federal authorities by his own sons. A year later he admitted to the investigators that he had lost $50 billion dollars of his investors’ money and pled guilty to 11

Bernie Madoff began his career as an investment broker in 1960, where he legally bought and sold over-the-counter stocks not listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). From the 1960’s through the 1990’s, Madoff’s success and business grew substantially, mainly from a closed circle of known investors and friends through word of mouth. In the 1990’s Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities traded up to 10 percent of the NASDAQ on any given day. With the success of the securities business, Madoff started an illegal money-management business, promising his investors consistent returns from 10-12 percent, unheard of returns at the time, which should have tipped off most investors that something was amiss.

In the past few years, enterprise integrity has come up on a regular subject of conversation. In the past ten years only, we have seen numerous situations associated with collaborative scams which have shaken the people 's trust in businesses and also the general economic climate. A few of the many salient frauds are the WorldCom and Enron 's scams, the ponzi scheme perpetrated by Bernard Madoff 's, the latest accusations of Goldman Sachs tricking option traders to guarantee the company 's personal profit. Incidents such as these designed us all, as upcoming corporation professionals as well as market leaders, think about ethics and its particular function in the commercial world (Gross, 2010.)

He exuded the confidence that derives from being the smartest person in the room. “The Big Bankroll” was a consultant, financier, and mentor to some of the original founders of the Italian mafia, particularly Lucky Luciano. As mentioned in The Drug War: A Trillion Dollar Con Game, Rothstein operated one of the first global heroin trafficking organizations and managed several bootlegging networks. There may never have been a man more successful with using his intelligence for such deceptive means. For example, he masterminded a $9.5 million stock market fraud case and fenced millions of dollars of stolen government bonds. However, Rothstein’s bread and butter operations consisted mainly from illegal gambling proceeds. He owned a number of gambling halls, racetracks, and “bucket shops.” Rothstein was also recognized as the person who invented the “floating card game” in which the location of high stakes card games changed on a nightly basis. He also had a bookmaking network that spanned the nation. In fact, he is recognized as the first bookmaker to accept “layoff” bets from other bookies. Rothstein enabled bookmakers with smaller bankrolls to hedge some of the risk from their clients’ wagers. In other words, second-tier bookmakers could “layoff” their bets with Rothstein to offset their

His rags to riches life represents many ideals associated with the American Dream, but through his illegal actions he is the opposite of a dream. He achieved his status through gang violence and sale of illegal substances (The Income Tax Law is a lot of Bunk). These illegal actions began as a result of Italian oppression in Chicago where Capone lived for a majority of his life (Corsino). In an article pertaining to the start of organized crime, “Italians in Chicago heights experienced an abiding social, economic, and political discrimination” (Corsino). The isolation of a social group forces them to find an outlet to success. The success of crime groups in the 1920s does not correlate with initial violence due to it being inefficient for running illegal operations (Corsino). Instead of initial violence Italian crime groups manipulated the sale of illegal substances, which created successful ventures. In relation to Capone, society was set up for his success after prohibition and Italian

In New York, Arnold Rothstein was “the man.” He was a bootlegger, he also sold narcotics, and he started off many big names in crime such as Charles “Lucky” Luciano, Frank Costello and Dutch Shultz. Rothstein made friends with as many bootleggers and gamblers as he could. He never wanted anything to go wrong. He was sort of paranoid but Rothstein was a very powerful man. The most incredible act ever made by a thug just may have been the fixing of the 1919 World Series between the Reds and the White Sox. Many of the White Sox star players wanted higher wages, owners of the club refused. But Rothstien changed that. It was said that he paid off eight of the White Sox players 10,000 dollars each. The Red’s would have lost but with a little help from Rothstein the White Sox did lose and Rothstein got back all of his money winning bets.

Bernard Madoff was the ring leader behind what many to believe as one of if not the biggest case of fraud in United States history. It has been said that he is responsible for the theft of over $60 billion from investors that thought they were making a worthy investment. His process is what is referred to as a Ponzi scheme which is an illegal financial practice and Madoff is now paying the price for his actions. Bernard Lawrence Madoff was born in Queens, New York no April 29, 1938. Madoff is the son of Ralph and Sylvia Madoff, both of whom had parents that were immigrants to the United States.

Mark Cuban is a self-made billionaire who has made his fortune by his innovating idea; online media. He was born in July 31, 1958 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, then he grew up in a middle-class family. His grandfather immigrated into the United States from Russia, and from there the Cuban’s family started to develop. Mark was always one step forward, and always saw a way to make money. At a young age, when he was twelve years old, he sold sets of garbage bags so he can buy the shoes he likes, and gave dance classes while he was at college so he could pay his tuition. Cuban has an excellent education history; he began his college education while he was in still in high school. He started his college education in Pittsburgh University in psychology,

Born on April 29, 1938 in Queens New York Bernie Madoff was the child of Polish immigrants. Madoff showed little interest in his early years for finance. He went on to graduate from Hofstra University and married soon after. Madoff used a modest $5,000 he had saved and $50,000 borrowed from his father0in-law to begin his investment firm in the 1960s. On December 11, 2008 it all came to an end. Madoff would go on to plead guilty to 11 felony counts including but not limited to securities fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, and perjury. Prosecutors would claim that over $170 billion was moved through Madoffs firm over the years, just prior to his arrest 65 billion dollars was being shown on the financial statements.

Madoff s father in laws loaned him $50,000 to start Bernard L Madoff Investment Securities. Many of his family members worked for him in key

While doing more reading and research, I do not believe that Bernard Madoff worked alone. I believe that he had help in creating and sustaining his Ponzi scheme. We know that his business was owned and operated by primarily his family members. When looking into the scheme, it appears that maybe he had assistance from people that were in his family. Although, they could have assisted in the scheme without truly knowing in depth the details of the scheme that they were partaking in. These people aided and helped with the fraud to make it continue on for the length of time that it did. Again we know that Bernard Madoff’s family members played a large role in his business. Some primary family members included Bernard Madoff’s brother and also his

Bernard Madoff had full control of the organizational leadership of Bernard Madoff Investments Securities LLC. Madoff used charisma to convince his friends, members of elite groups, and his employees to believe in him. He tricked his clients into believing that they were investing in something special. He would often turn potential investors down, which helped Bernard in targeting the investors with more money to invest. Bernard Madoff created a system which promised high returns in the short term and was nothing but the Ponzi scheme. The system’s idea relied on funds from the new investors to pay misrepresented and extremely high returns to existing investors. He was doing this for years; convincing wealthy individuals and charities to

He had started his business with a loan of $200, but within months he had two offices in Boston with a staff of dozens of employees processing sales, and he bought a modest mansion for $35,000. Of course, there were no actual profits, Ponzi had not actually bought the IRCs, and he paid early investors with the funds derived from later investors. This only worked well for him because of the rapid payments made to investors. People saw what he could do and they wanted in, so he was selling the IRC’s quickly and convincing people to reinvest their funds, he was able to postpone his financial obligations even longer. By the time the scheme collapsed his income was estimated at $1M per week, and late coming investors were defrauded of between $7 - $15M. The downfall started from some investigative journalism, this led to the District attorney getting involved and Ponzi being charged. Most of Ponzi's gains were seized in an involuntary bankruptcy hearing, and what little remained was spent in his subsequent legal battles. Ponzi’s scheme was exposed by newspaper reports in 1920 and despite his claims of innocence, a federal audit confirmed his operation was bankrupt, owing almost $4 million or more to investors. After investigation, Ponzi was charged with 86 counts of mail fraud and sentenced to five years in federal prison, and while incarcerated on federal charges he

Bernard Madoff was born on April 29, 1938, in Queens, New York. He used $5,000 earned from a lifeguarding job to found his investment company. Madoff's firm offered reliable returns and his client list included celebrities like Steven Spielberg. Madoff's son reported him for securities fraud

In the year 1960, with money he earned installing sprinkler systems and as a lifeguard on the beaches of Long Island, Bernard Madoff founded “Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities,” a “trading power” house that would become one of the largest independent trading operations in the securities industry (Washington, 2012). In the year 2000 his company ranked among the top trading and securities firms in the nation. By age 70, his name had become legendary; he was considered to be one of the most “influential spokesmen” on Wall Street. But on December 11, 2008, Bernard Madoff was arrested and charged “in a 20 year Ponzi scheme, which would come to be known as “the most infamous fraud in Wall Street history (Leonard, 2008;