One of my favorite all time movie scenes involved Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper in the film True Romance. The dialogue between Walken, the mob lawyer, and Hopper, the soon to bedead ex-cop, was priceless. While researching and reporting on the numerous instances of investment fraud, I often think of a statement made by Walken’s […]
In a case that would have garnered national attention if the company perpetrating the fraud wascalled Halliburton, Exxon Mobil, Lockheed Martin or Wall-mart…Morgan Stanley will pay $12.5 million to settle a regulator’s charges that it repeatedly failed to provide incriminating e-mails, and lied when they claimed they were lost during the September 11, 2001 terrorist […]
The first thing that came to my mind when finding out about this latest hedge fund scandal was the fact that I have discovered either the plotline for the latest Rob Schneider film or the sequel to Eyes Wide Shut. I could not make this stuff up if I wanted to. Who needs the Hollywood […]
In a deal worthy of comparison to the United Nations Iraq oil for food scam due to its moxie and effectiveness, I give you the Big Brokerage Money for Nothing Scandal. This has nothing to do with Dire Straits, Sting or early MTV videos (before they turned into soft-core porn). This has to do with […]
A new academic report by Professors Vikas Agarwal, Naveen Daniel and Narayan Naik entitled Why is Santa So Kind To Hedge Funds? studied the performance of hedge funds returns for the month of December. The professors looked at 7,535 hedge funds from 1994-2002 and what they found is in their words is a “December spike.” […]
One of the more popular items being sold on the free lunch/dinner seminar circuit is the equity indexed annuity. It is our opinion that EIA’s are a seriously deficient financial product. I do not even like calling it a product; it is more of a high fee/commission gimmick. According to an April 2 report in […]
So you bought into the hype. The slick talking hedge fund manager nailed you hook, line and sinker. You put up your money and hoped that the hedge fund manager was just a tenth as good at making money as he said he was. A year down the road, you get that gut feeling that […]
I am so popular. I get invited out to dinner to swanky French restaurants, the Ritz Carlton, and golf clubs by people I don’t even know two to three times a week It seems like every investment guru in the state of Florida wants to wine and dine me. The unfortunate reality is that I […]
There are very few financial commentators that have the ability to entertain as well as inform. One of my favorites is Mark Gilbert from Bloomberg News. Several months ago he used the innocuous world of bovines to eloquently describe several areas of the financial world that have become conspicuously popular. Here is our off-beat take… […]
I have noticed an increase in the volume of programs on sports networks that deal with the issue of who or what is number one, and why. “Who was a better quarterback? Montana or Elway or who was a better pitcher Clemens or Gibson?” This is a harmless and sometimes interesting endeavor that often makes […]