Madoff investors when they thought the money was rolling in: "The government needs to keep it's nose out of our business." Madoff investors when they found out they'd been scammed" "The government should have known this was going on and stopped it."
_The _*_love of money_*_ is the root of all sorts of injurious things. And by reaching out for this love some have been led astray & stabbed themselves all over with many pains_ ~Saint Paul
@@Stormcoaster101That reply still doesn’t make you any more “in the know”. Quiet…you hear me? Shhh…boy. In the words of Keller P. Williams, “be humble, sit down.” Boy. I’ll say it again, boi?!? Flick that wrist t-girl.
These sharks are getting as much as 35 percent return now days . Far more then Madoff . And getting away with it and the market turns a blind eye on it . Go figure . 😮😢
Remember human greedy is like the red ants ( when a red ant finds honey in container it consumes the honey too much and finally falls into the container and ends up downed) .
@@abubakariabdulai9505people weren’t greedy. These were regular people just trying to pay for retirement. Even charities “invested” with Madoff. That’s not greed, that’s capitalism. And ants eat honey because of the nutrients. Not because they like the taste.
No mention of Congress slashing the SEC’s budget so they hadn’t enough agents and supplies to get people on the streets. Of course, that required honesty, something Congress-types aren’t familiar with.
They were ALL lying! They knew something wasn't right! SEC was taking BRIBES to keep quiet. Sad thing is, there are probably 50 other people, now doing the same thing! "Fractional reserve stocking..." Now, they just make up shares that don't even exist...According to the SEC, it's only "fraud"...If the market collapses!
@@brentfarvors192 And as to Bienes's outlook....its only a crime if ya get caught. Lol. Michael Bienes can blame Madoff all he wants, but he was just as guilty, if not more so. He procured investors for Madoff, to be sure to collect HIS "Thirty pieces of silver" finder's fee.
I find it hard to believe a licensed CPA saying he wouldn’t understand an explanation of the way it works. He is a liar of the extreme. All part of the con!!!!
I will never understand how people always blame the government whenever there’s a problem but Can’t comprehend that when you eliminate regulations you have absolute chaos.
indeed. Like, you're dealing with trades and investments. There's no such thing as zero risk and 18 percent returns are just not happening. And in the slight chance you managed to get in early enough that you do see those returns, it's because several someones who invested more recently are never seeing a dime of that money again. Yet we see time and time again with FTX, with all these crypto shitcoins- people seem almost *more* willing to literally throw their entire networth away when someone promises them something impossible.
@@dahliacheung6020The twin forces of Greed and FOMO are a hell of a way to cloud people's judgement. I can understand how some people see value in taking risk in the stock market to profit, but at some point, you have to draw the line and realize that sometimes things just are too good to be true. There's no such thing as a 0% risk investment, but the sheer scale of money and profits involved doubtless swayed people into making horrible decisions in the eternal game of one-upsmanship that is capitalism.
@somedeveloperblokey Bienes: "I swear on my mother's GRAVE I was convinced the money was legit" Interviwer: "But it was easy money, right?" - "Yes. When friends found out how much I made, they said 'You must be working hard for it, right?' But I told 'em it was the easiest money I ever made" - "See? Right there. If the money was TOO easy you knew something was wrong" *Famous last words:* _I never knew... I swear on my mother's grave._ Well geez, Mr Bienes, if it smells like a skunk, it's a SKUNK
@@cmcgloughlin Right! That's the spirit! He hit every branch of the tree on the way down... multiple concussions with brain damage 😋😋🤕 *EDIT:* Well the YT 'bots are at it again. Benign & harmless as it is, my comment was removed. This is my attempt to put it back... Good grief! Can't anyone have an OPINION or tell a harmless joke anymore?!?! Evidently not!
Yeah, but they got screwed me in because they ended up having to pay back the interest that they made on the money they invested and the taxes on the interest. Although I still can’t understand how anybody could think they could make a steady amount of percentage, monthly or yearly. It just reeks of a scam.
I dont know why but just listening to him say that and when asked about whether he knew or asked Madoff how he was making that kind of money and saying "nevaaah" he just sounds like a crook.
@@pabloescoto7229 yep. His "ohhh I don't know. Do I know how to split an atom" BS... like this guy is literally showering you with an INSANE ROI YET YOU DON'T KNOW HOW HE DOES IT, "HE JUST DOES IT" YEA, OK👌🤣
There's an old saying: The big thieves hang the little thieves. The takeaway: The big thieves never hang each other. The documentary could not have made this point any more clear.
Absolutely! Everybody that was giving him big money KNEW what he was up to.... Only when he got caught, Then tried to pretend they uninformed, hapless victims in the whole thing Amazing how his whole family was ravaged after the scandal...only the wife escaped with her life
"I blame the government. I really truly do." Says the guy who took no action to investigate the guy showing financial magic tricks. Says the guy who KNEW something wasn't up to snuff but loved those initial checks. Now that the well is dry, it's the governments fault.
Great Documentary, only one thing to take from it is: Never try to screw rich people out of their money, if you do, you will end up in jail for a very very long time. Do the same thing with the poor and everyonewill call it "will of the free market" and CEOs will get millions in bonuses and golden parachutes
I have worked in corporate finance for just about my entire career, and it is baffling to me that this fraudulent enterprise survived as long as it did. Especially as high profile as the firm was, you would think the SEC would have been all over them when even cursory examination from an untrained eye would have quickly pointed to the mathematical impossibility of returns. The fundamental problem of Wall Street is that the banks, hedge funds, brokerages, IB's etc. are always infinitely more talented and resourceful than the fed employees and agencies who are tasked with stopping potential impropriety. Any given day there are hundreds of such con games in play, and only a minor fraction are ever caught.
It is always an issue because top talent regulators almost always get swayed over to the private sector outside of the few passionate who remain. But I always think the absurdity of it not being caught more than anything was the bank account at Chase that held the money. How in the world does Chase never say anything about this account that has $1B+ sitting in it? Amazing that nobody bothered to wonder why such an absurd balance of deposits is sitting in this account.
@@Matt-cr4vv I have to believe that its always the same reason: not my job to throw stones especially when I am making money off it. Chase was definitely earning interest on that money.
You build a better mouse trap, nature builds a better mouse. The con seem to hinge entirely on the dopamine hit that investors acquired in not only apparently making tidy returns on their money, but the egoic kick they’d receive from being esteemed and astute enough to be along for the ride.
I’ve worked in the financial industry for years and I’m currently employed with a Fortune 500 company. I make less than 6 figures a year (just a regular service representative), but I’m telling you, just from my experience, the entire financial industry is riddled with oversight and fraud.
They thought all the secrecy was because they thought they were making money by cheating the system via front running trades on the exchanges. So thats why they went along.
The MAJORITY yes others were largely clueless . Others saw themselves part of an elite rarefied privileged few . arrogance pure denial and narcissism were there folly . In the end it is Ruth who walked away with 2 . 5 million did she know the truth . I think she did . I know she lost both her children but in interviews when she mentions her children she shows zero emotion . The only passion you see is her passionate denials of her role in the crime . He robbed Holocaust survivors of there life savings .
Most of these people were bragging about investing with Madoff. "Our money is with Madoff but you can't get in with him. Its by Invitation only". I don't feel any sympathy for these investors.
Yeah and they are all acting like they didn't see the signs. But they can't answer the question why. The real answer is they saw easy money and were so greedy, they didn't care.
What about the ordinary people? No sympathy for those who had to move into new homes cause of him. Sell their Cars cause of him. Change their complete life cause of him. Thats the point yes he stole from the rich but they were not the ones that had to go through the pain. It was the ordinadry people.
Listening to Sandra Manske is just hilarious. Every time she’s confronted about something she just deflects and says, “Well…that’s just how it was…we didn’t question it…” She was in on it. Had to have been. How can you recognize all these things, claim to have been “bothered” by some of them, and still go through with it without being a part of it.
Yes. When that woman answered questions with: «Yes, but…»…she’s basically telling us, the viewers, SHE KNEW BUT DIDN’T CARE BECAUSE THE $$$ WAS ROLLING IN. GREED. PERIOD.
You don't get this big without the government, other Wall Street firms and the SEC being complicit in the crime. Money talks. And let's not pretend this stuff still doesn't go on to this day on Wall Street
As V. Lenin was alleged to have said: "When the time comes to hang them, the capitalists will sell us the rope." I could never quite figure out why our leaders thought it was a good-idea to partner-up with the most bloodthirsty genocidal regime in recorded history. I remember reading a news item in 2010 saying that General Electric had decided to build jet-engine factories in China. I thought: "Jet Engines? the kind we use in long-range bombers? Why would the government approve that?" Now we know.
"Thirty-two hundred seems to be more than fifteen," made me spit out my drink. It's so ridiculous I can't help thinking, "but are you sure it's more? Can you really be certain?" And said with a straight face too! These people, man. They lie as easy as they breathe and make the most stupendous statements as if they were saying something like, "yes, I did have coffee this morning..."
Madoff’s programmers were the real geniuses. They designed software that automatically allocated fictitious trades to individual accounts and created a phantom computer trading platform in case an investor, regulator, or auditor requested to see how the operation worked. They knew it was a fraud from the beginning and should be in prison.
Imagine that genius be used, I don’t know, to promote transparency in financial services and insurance? We’ve got a ways to go as humans. And @Professor, you’re right - lots of integrations to manage, especially in those days.
Two accountants had no idea how this magical 20%+ return was created and no deep questions to find out...maybe they worked for Arthur Anderson i.e. Enron
I ended up laughing the whole way through. All those predatory greedy people preying on each other and they all got screwed. Oh, and it was the government's fault lmao
From 1:40 to 1:50 listening to how his friend is describing news of Bernie's arrest and what he thought the reasons were "sex crimes". Shows you who these people are and what they do behind closed doors.
Thinking about this now, the movie "Wall Street" with Michael Douglas and Charlie Sheen was made waaaaay before this was ever exposed. Maybe Madoff used it as a blueprint. Wall Street is incredibly shady and corrupt. The SEC are inept clowns.
I noticed that too. Thinking of "sex crimes" in a "nanosecond" doesn't exactly make them look good. I bet there's so much dirt that hasn't even been uncovered.
The people who gave their money to Madoff are the ones who praised him and sent all their friends to his office. And the second the scam came to light, those same people pointed their fingers directly to him, and they were the first ones to call him out. They perfectly knew it was fishy and signed in anyway, yet they played the innocent card when they lost everything. By blindly entrusting millions to Madoff without any precaution or questioning whatsoever, they reaped what they sowed and thus they're almost as responsible as Madoff.
Christine Allen - You are misinformed. - Madoff described the investment fund as "one big lie" to his sons - who promptly informed the authorities. Madoff was arrested the next day and his assets were frozen - as were those of his wife - and sons' assets later on. Do your homework.
@@andrew_koala2974 what am I missed informed about ? He only admitted it b/c ppl were pulling out and asking for their money b/c of the crash !! Do your homework !!
That hearing is the best part of the entire video, him saying "one guy and his friends figured it out over a decade ago and you guys couldn't figure it out." Then she starts talking about having actions pending in the southern district of New York and congressman Ackerman says "you took action after the guy confessed, he turned himself in, don't pat yourself on the back for that". Absolutely hilarious, the SEC couldn't have been more incompetent, it would be like the FBI only catching criminals who confess and bring their own evidence against themselves to an FBI field office. Ridiculous.
Any successful scam and pyramid scheme always has a legitimate component as well. Madoff not wanting to register with the SEC or get licensed should have been a red flag!
Other investors accepted lower returns because they knew it was too good to be true …you can’t protect people from being greedy so don’t expect to be bailed out by the government tax payers money..
@@jtiger1062 : No one in this documentary asked the government to bail them out. Yes, they tried to blame the government, but no one asked the government to give them back their money.
The amount of greed and willingness to turn a blind eye in both the 2008 collapse and Bernie Madoff, goes so deep and extensive that the show American Greed could do a 16 part series on it and not run out of material.
These people just took money for pretending to buy and sell stocks. Typical dishonest business practices. They are nothing compared to the W.H.O., the CDC, the FDA, the AMA, The traitorous politicians, and all the complicit “news” agencies that helped perpetrate the greatest crime against humanity that we’ve seen. The NAZI’s of 1940’s Germany were identified as the monsters they were and punished for their crimes. The global cabal that foisted the frauds around CO**D 19 on the planet and all the extenuating damage on generations to come have all been ignored and escape even the smallest justice for what they colluded to do.
I mean it’s really hard to believe his kids ran a large trading operation 2 floors away and had no idea at all he was in over his eyeballs. They definitely had to have known things were not right.😂
Greed is the American Dream. Wholesome and honest, but always driven for the desire to be affluent and well to do. The very nature of investing is greed. "I want my hard earned money to no longer be hard earned. I want my money to make money, and I don't have to do a thing." The American motto, get paid for doing nothing.
In “people pleaser” Madoff’s extraordinary effort to never let his investors down ultimately led to letting everyone of them down quite dramatically. A real irony tragedy.
Martin Smith is one of the very best investigative journalists/documentary film makers on the news beat, today! His details are unmatched. So many thanks to his co-writer Marcela Gaviria for your tireless work and your research crew!
💯% agreed. Martin Smith & Lowell Bergman are the last of a dying breed. Everyone from Walter Kronkite to Mike Wallace, Ted Koppel, Charles Koralt, & many others are long gone now. And accolades to Bill Kurtis for his _Decades_ Channel... Investigative Reporting has been dead a long time in this Country, along with the fine people who for several decades (?? 50 years) made it what it was. Even PBS' _Nova_ occasionally deviated from their usual Science & Technology to delve deep into major stories at one time, such as the "Exxon Valdez" disaster in 1989, with their episode _The Big Spill..._ We're talking about once in a lifetime & once in a century exposés, with the very best background information & due diligence... Miles of videotape locked away in archives likely never to be seen by the public again, except MAYBE in some randomly occurring, future PBS special 😪🇺🇸
30:00 It's funny how Sandra Manzke ( with all her education) is being told by Martin Smith what she should have done back on those days , being on top position, how to catch and confirm the legitimacy of Bernie's account. But Bernie was really smart because he targeted the likes of her who is greedy to the core! They are so greedy with the constant flow of money that they did not bother to confirm.
43:56 - "You took action after the guy confessed! He turned himself in! Don't give yourself a pat on the back for that...." haha. Rep. Ackerman of New York is my hero.
The NetFlix special on Maddof is amazing and worth the watch. It’s crazy how the SEC looked the other way on this whole thing when he was right under their nose
@@oncoucharrest5910 right! The one that committed suicide died on either his dads birthday or something specific to his dad, and the other probably had severe stress caused by this situation which can be a contributor to getting cancer! That’s all I was getting at!
@@apemancommeth9651 the son was diagnosed with cancer before the news broke about the scheme but I’m sure the stress of the situation didn’t help with his well being. Take care 😊
Some of the members of the SEC had to have been personally benefitting from Madoff con. It is the only motive (to look the other way) that makes sense.
Returns ~18% Do you know Madoff? "No" Do you know how they make money? "No" "I blame the government. I truly really do. 😡" This shit is too beautiful to believe it wasn't scripted 😂
Smart people getting outsmarted by not only others but ultimately themselves because they couldn’t see the Ponzi scheme lie and chose to put their money with him is just pure poetry. Life always finds a way to make things right. These people deserved what happened to them because they invested with Madoff due to disgusting greed.
Then don’t ask for pity when catastrophe hits your life, and you’re out on the street. Guarantee if you’d ever struggled in your life, you wouldn’t be saying this.
I'm sorry but if someone promises you a steady annual return of about 20% and you believe him, then you can't blame the government. Most of his investors were sophisticated people who should have known better but they were blinded by greed.
Previously chairman of the NASDAQ, the guy wasn't even registered with the SEC and had thousands of customers and billions under management. Simply crazy. And the SEC was alerted at least 5 times and nothing happened and nothing ever would have happened if not for the financial crisis in housing. It's almost hard to believe!
People have to accept that only sociopaths and those afflicted with borderline personality disorder make it in the financial sector. Good natured people are never involved in finance. Never.
All he had to do is place $650M in Apple in 2008 and he would have $42B today. I just don't understand why he never took the large amounts of cash and invest in great companies - even during the fruad. He had access to information on the street. He knew he was on borrowed time, so why not take a shot at the market?
You have to look back at the time some of them invested. Its not like today were if you dont have a clue about something you can google it. Google and the internet didnt exist.
@@conduit242 look im not saying that they couldnt do their own due diligence I'm just saying it was a little harder to figure out numbers when it comes to the stock market back then especially at the age that some of these people were at.
How can you not watch this, it is so well done. Our capitalist culture is greed driven, it is not unthinkable that this is still happening with improved technology available to today’s scammers.
I think capitalist culture has was the driver but the SEC was the democratic institution that failed to stop that greed. There will always be scammers and cheaters but the govt's failure to address it for 10 years clearly shows how democracy can erode over time.
Mr. Bienes is one of the Greatest American Actors of all time. I Love his style. 'I'm too stupid to understand how I accidentally stole millions of dollars'. Marlon Brando step aside for master Thespian Bienes !!
I always wonder what it was like working at Madoff's firm. Coming in day after day, sitting at your desk working, your one to one appraisals and meetings etc etc. And the whole time it was just a ponzi scheme where no investing/trading was even taking place. Like those employees were like the most dedicated real life background artists/extras of all time
Madoff had two firms, the legitimate one was where the vast majority of his employees were (like 98% of them) and the other was a total sham. They were in the same building, one took up the 18th floor and the sham business was in the 17th floor and was apparently devoid of people beyond a just a few (a couple who went to prison with him and some secretary types who didn't know enough to understand what was going on). For the secretary types it was probably an amazing job. I'm sure they were paid quite well and didn't have nearly as tough of a job as they would have in a legitimate business. The other few people on the 17th floor went to prison along with one outside 'auditor'. I imagine their existence was pretty full of stress wondering when the house of cards would collapse but also reveling in the money at the same time.
If anyone has ever seen the movie "The Sting", Paul Newman's character recruits all of these drifters to act as legitmate patrons at the gambling house to deceive Robert Shaw's character to get him to bet all of his money with him thinking all along that he was going to beat the house . He was falsely tipped off on which horse was going to win the race and he was scammed out of his money. The similarites to what happened here are amazingly close. The people working for Madoff's firm knew damn well they weren't doing anything else but scamming people out of their money as they performed little to no trades whatsoever, and the the people being scammed were blinded by greed.
One of the main things I've always wondered about - these purportedly sofisticated investors were getting account statements and share trade records printed on a DOT MATRIX printer, right up to 2008. Yet nobody thought that was odd - complete tunnelvision and oblivionness to what should (to so-called intelligent people) be one of the biggest red flags ever unfurled ...
