Comments on: Three Investing Lessons from Bernie Madoff

By: SR Hammersley

SR Hammersley — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 20:26:11 +0000

Good Article on Madoff but BEWARE. I just heard of a small town broker who is entertaining his wealthier prospective clients at his vacation home with his family, waiting on them hand and foot. It may be hear-say or perhaps he has taken a Lesson from Mr. M. Is this method of prospecting legal or am I out of touch? Like I said may be hear-say.

By: tarran dookie

tarran dookie — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 03:24:40 +0000

i am curious as to who is going to be able to champion the small- time California Stockbroker cause against the SEC. He obviously knows what integrity is all about. His debt together with loss of earnings must be met fully by the bullying of the SEC. The bigger question in my mind is the fact that the SEC is going to get away with this type of behaviour?

By: Tom Healy

Tom Healy — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 18:17:52 +0000

“There is a great deal of virtue in the old proverb, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” From time to time, you hear some guru suggest a modern alternative: “Put all your eggs in one basket –and watch that basket!” ”

We have our investments at a major brokerage firm (affiliated with a large worldwide bank) and at a discount broker. I’m considering moving everything to the discount broker; my wife, however, is wondering if that amounts to putting “all our eggs in one basket.” I don’t believe so, since I have a significant number of investments (including many of the OC recommendations), and all of them are protected with stop loss orders.

By: Fay

Fay — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 12:33:00 +0000

Finally, someone who has told the truth about investing. After all the noise about Madoff, this is the first article I’ve seen that gives the basic advice needed for investing. Study, learn, check, use diversity and do it yourself. No one cares about your money more than you do.

By: Carol

Carol — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 01:09:13 +0000

Your comment about having all your wealth in only a single brokerage account being foolish has me concerned. Are funds in my Vanguard account at risk, since I make all purchasing decisions?

By: Juan V Arisitizabal

Juan V Arisitizabal — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:45:22 +0000

Yes, every bitter experience leave teachings. I agree with you: markets will not be the same. We have learned to be on the safe side. But, is there anything left untouched?
Gold: The brokers get the big share!
Stocks: The brokers will never loose.
Bonds: You are loosing since the begining.
Real state: It will recover. It will be costlier to build.
Land: It will never be replaced. After the sixth day the Lord got tired. He rested on the seventh. No more land will be made.
Energy: That will be the future problem. there will not be enough. Buy it now: Oil, electrical power, etc.
I am starting to undersatand future!

By: Investigate before you invest | Stock Capitalist

Investigate before you invest | Stock Capitalist — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 00:20:41 +0000

[...] ORIGINAL ARTICLE [...]

By: Ralph Madoff

Ralph Madoff — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:59:11 +0000

If you really want to use the ’skills’ of Madoff you might consider recommending him to a govt position say at the SEC since he managed to pull the wool over their eyes for years and has not only destroyed peoples lives by all the other Madoff’s in the world

Of course the real culprits are the FED and US govt who have been running the biggest ponzi scheme ever invented ’social security’ so nothing that Madoff did is any different from what the FED is doing today except they are on the ‘legal’ side of the ledger. Just think if the current crises had never progressed to this stage Madoff would still be happily in business since he managed to PAY all of his ‘private security’ investors over 2 decades at a far higher return than what DSS are going to pay the 90 million boomer’s expecting a monthly check so PLEASE do not waste Bernie’s valuable experience and quickly ‘force hire’ him into any nationalized govt agency that pretends to redistribute money in an ethical/legal manner. The state of Calif could really use Bernie today as my IOU’s are not accepted by Alpha Beta Safeway or my landlord!

By: Laurette Looney

Laurette Looney — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 20:47:54 +0000

It seems to be an American penchant to go after the small fry and persecute them to death even when innocent. Why? I have no idea, perhaps it is due to the fact that bureaucratic people with huge egos like to stomp on people with small or normal sized ones. The big bad frys have huge egos and defense budgets themselves and are therefore untouchable. It seems like basic human psychology here OR Am I missing something here?

By: Bob

Bob — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 20:41:45 +0000

The people who invested with Madoff were not greedy and are deserving of pity. There but for the grace of G’d go I. Madoff’s fund showed relatively modest but consistent returns, something particularly appealing to retirees. Madoff also had enormous credibility as a former head of the Nasdaq exchange. His scam would have continued to expand had not the financial markets collapsed and everyone demanded their money. You are quite right in saying that the Madoff investors who had all their savings invested in one place made a huge mistake. However, in many cases funds were channeled to Madoff through intermediaries, so many investors did not even know they were investing with Madoff.