Mr Tan
I note that in the Madoff case the prosecutors are considering prosecuting the programmers and perhaps the heads of the feeder funds. Presumably this is on the basis that they must have been aware that
something was not right but did nothing about it. They also took huge payments for supporting a scam..
It takes many parties to operate a scam. I am often amazed that when investment schemes fail that the sales people and agents blame the owners. The owners blame the agents and salepeople. All parties claim
complete innocence of any wrong doing. With some of the investment schemes such as land banking plots, various oil Investment schemes, sunshine investments etc it is obvious that many people involved know
that the investment scheme cannot work but choose to be involved anyway.
These people enable the scam and give it credibility by their involvement.
Singapore has a reputation for providing rigourous punishment to a few individuals to discouorage anti-social or criminal behaviour by the rest of the population. As an example:- jail sentences being applied
for using mobile phones while driving.
Perhaps applying very stiff penalties to one or two company directors, sale people and agents for their involvement in fraudulent investment schemes would encourage others to think more carefully about what they
allow themselves to be involved in and earn commission for.
REPLY
I agree with your views. I am unhappy with the passive response of the Authority in Singapore towards these investment scams. I will do my best to argue the case for the Authority to be more actively involved in stopping these scams.
10 comments:
Move on, the authorities would lift a finger.
When it comes to the crunch, their own face is first, Singapore's reputation being pushed to the back.
Basically our property sector is a scam. A big bubble waiting to blow-up. First Japan, second USA and UK, Spain. Next, the 4 Asian dragons Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea. HDB flats selling for $660,000 for 99 years. I would rather buy a freehold condo at $290,000 elsewhere, with cheaper utility bills. And lower property taxes too. The bubble is going to blow in your faces and those who are over-leveraged will be slaughtered when interest rates spike north when the game is over.
They already said they can't force the FIs to compensate the investors.
They prefer FIDREC and get
interogated by their representatives.
The regulator has this to say to all of you investors..
We are sorry that we are powerless and useless . Our salary comes from the FIs. We are formed to look after their interest and protect them.
Our investigation is a wayang. Please don't wait for the outcome. Although there is an eventual outcome but it will take many decades to complete as this is a very complicated case.Do you want to wait?
Move on and next time open your eyes big big aND READ THE PROsPECTUS properly and carefully.Get a proffesor to help if possible because that it is how financial products were intended in the first place. If you make money where do FIs make to let you make. Everyone wants high salary money from ceo to the salesman disguised as consultants .
Anyway, the good news is we are trying to make brochures , prospectus in plain Singlish as you understand so that you can make informed decision.But remember it will be caveat emptor.
You think to make 5% no risks wah?
The agents or RMs can say guarantee but you investors must do due diligence.
Another good news is to help you understand risks we also are setting up an Institute just for you to educate you, to sell you seminars, to help you understand life insurance and investment to make you savvy and financial expert, eventually to certify you as certified investors so that no insurance agent , RMs or FA can con or bullshit you becuase you will know as much as they do.We make exams as simpler as possible, only 5 questions as few as risk profiling questionaire, open book and tikam tikam UNTIL you tikam the right answers.The insurance agents also do same thing and you are no less inferior.If you want,you can bring your pets or even monkeys as proxy for the exams.Uncles or aunties worry about exams? Don't worry, bring your grand children to take them for you.
The future is for the certified investors.
Most notable are the big firm lawyers that help to write the legal documents for these investment scams.
These reputable lawyers should be aware that the investment schemes are not sound and may be cheating the public.
I hope that these firms will uphold the reputation of the legal profession and stay away from providing legal advice to the promoters of the unsound schemes.
They should be pro-active in highlighting these unsound schemes to the Authority who can investigate and take appropriate action.
It will be a sad state of affairs if the reputable legal firms lend their name to these investment scams and make credibility to these schemes.
If Paul Krugman said that if very firm cut wages, how would that help to generate more employment? In fact, the reduced wages of workers will mean less demand for the goods and services produced by the firms, leading to contraction of the economy.
"They already said they can't force the FIs to compensate the investors.
They prefer FIDREC and get
interogated by their representatives."
My Adjudication meeting was cordial and the judge was friendly & fair. I did most of the talking and the FI reps did not talk much. Everytime they open their mouth, I have an ready answer for them. Don't wait, go through FIDREC, have no fear and just be honest with your FIs selling process. All the best.
Much was made in the press of the "black box" system that Maddoff used to generate consistent annual returns of 12%. The box was actually a system that used historic data to report investment results to investors so investors always thought they were in profit.
I just saw this description of the contents of the land banking black box <a href="http://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/showthread.php?p=42547780>
here</a>
The (Land Banking) black box magic money system is a group of commission earning people with unverifiable opinions, and some cheap land with very low prospects for planning approval.
Very true !
Many insurance products are scams too.
Products like wholelife, endowment and anticipated endwoment. The consumers pay so much for so little return. They are sold like magic stone that can cure everything.Insurance agents peddle them becuase they whorthless magic stones and high commission to them.
They must be stopped and agents pushing them must be brought to justice.
Is anyone aware of this investment scheme (seems like multi-level marketing to me)involving huge development projects in certain part of China? The sales agent would fly (accom, food & air-tickets paid for)potential investors to China and try to impress them with the many WIP & completed projects funded by this investment scheme. Even our DBS, which has a branch there is quoted as an investor. After one agrees to put up funds as an investor, one is incentivised to get more investors to join the scheme. I understand many Singaporeans have already been lured into this scheme. Anyone has personal experiences to share?
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