65 billion
Bernie Madoffbegan his brokerage firm (Ponzi Scheme) in 1960 and grew it into one of the largest on Wall Street.While doing so, he began investing money as a favor to family and friends, thoughhe was not licensed to do so. Over a period of fi fty years, these side investments becamean investment fund that mushroomed into a $50 billion Ponzi scheme. Berniepled guilty without a trial on March 12, 2009, and was sentenced to 150 years in prison. Thousands of wealthy clients, philanthropic organizations, and middle-classpeople whose pension funds found their way into Bernie's investment fund lost theirlife savings.
A 'Ponzi scheme' is a scheme in which investors are promised extraordinary returns, but meanwhile these returns are simply paid out from the inflow off new funds from new investors in the scheme. This is much like a pyramid scheme and results in an eventual collapse in which investors lose most -- or all -- of their money.
It's a fraudulent investment scheme that works on a "pyramid concept" where the initial investers are paid abnormally high returns on their investment from money received from subsequent investors. With those returns providing "legitimacy" to the investment - the "schemer" can use that documented information to bait people with bigger bucks into the scheme. Because there is not an acutal investment in a company or other entity to generate money - the scheme will cave leaving those investors S.O.L. and the "schemer" who with any luck (on his part) has probably already left the country and has a numbered bank account in the Caymans! Watch the national news. There's a big one under investigation right now.
profit
If you were an investor in Madoff's ponzi scheme, you lost money.
Not yet. But Obama the socialist might find a way to make it happen.
Bernie Madoff is responsible for creating and running a large Ponzi investment scheme. In simple terms, a Ponzi scheme (named after a man of the name of Ponzi who was first credited with using this type of get-rich-quick methos of money) is where initially investors put in large sums of money. Madoff then gave large percents of that back, calling it the intrest made from the investment. The investors, believing that Madoff was investing their money wisely, invested more money. As new investors came in, their money went towards the fake-intrest-earnings for earlier investors, as so on. A majority of the money was taken (illegally) by Madoff and spent. It is suspected that millions and millions of dollars exist in private off-shore accounts and, due to their privacy, will never be known or recoverred.
Yes they will - from the Associated Press : " Proceeds will go to more than 3,000 clients Madoff swindled in a multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme. " ; you can read the rest of the news article at the related link below .
many individuals , corporations and a lot of charitible organizations. http://www.businessinsider.com/2008/12/bernie-madoff-hosed-client-list
Bernie Madoff stole billions of dollars and is now in prison. People gave him their money so he could help them make more money with it, but he just kept everyone's money instead.
No. But the team suffered the embarrassment of losing money invested with jailed financier Bernie Madoff.
Bernie Madoff's iniquitous behaviour with other people's money landed him in prison for life.
It is not publicly disclosed what Miles Fiterman is worth.
Yes, Bernie Madoff is Jewish. However, it is important to note that his religious faith irrelevant to the fraud and misery that he perpetrated. He never declared or implied any religious motives in doing the horrible things that he did, only a desire to make lots of money.
Hard to say. Some, like the Elie Wiesel Foundation, were wiped out completely. Others lost more money, but had more to start with so are still solvent.
A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investmentoperation that pays returns to its investors from their own money or the money paid by subsequent investors, rather than from any actual profit earned by the individual or organization running the operation. The Ponzi scheme usually entices new investors by offering higher returns than other investments, in the form of short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent. Perpetuation of the high returns requires an ever-increasing flow of money from new investors to keep the scheme going.