There have been quite an alarming number of successful prosecutions particularly in the United States of America where shameless charlatans exploited people’s ignorance and aspiration to make millions in shady deals. The poor investors were expecting to share some of the proceeds that accrued from these ventures but ended up getting a mere court appearance as a victim of financial crime.

The reputation of investment firms continued to nose dive as these revelations poured out of the popular press. Of course the prosecution authorities have tried to reassure the public by sending the culprits to prison. However this does not negate the trauma that has been caused.

Who Bears Responsibility ?
The first port of call has to be the criminals who set up the shady deals. They by their actions deprived millions of people of their lawfully earned money in an effort to make their own plans. They were able to manipulate the system and the people within the system to ensure that they were believed and the money was handed over to them. Of course many have paid by way of going to prison but some others are not yet being held to account for their actions.

Governments and regulatory authority have some questions to answer because they were specifically tasked with ensuring that there was transparency and effectiveness within the financial markets but then many of these authorities descended into bureaucratic incompetence to the extent that they were never allowed to do their job properly. Some conspiracy theorists even started speculating that some of these authorities were in on the act. This has not been proved and I am sure if it were proved, the responsible parties would be held accountable.

Some people took the precaution of hiring financial advisers who were responsible for guiding them into the business world. Some of these advisers gave the impression that they knew a lot more than they actually knew. They over stated the investment potential of certain projects while at the same time under estimating the risks associated with such investments. They neglected to update their clients when they discovered some of the irregularities that were becoming a feature of many of these schemes. In other words they failed to undertake their professional duties to an acceptable standard. Despite losing their jobs, many of them did not have to pay for their incompetence.

This is a very painful and sensitive thing to say but it must be noted that some of the investors themselves were rather too trusting or too ambitious. Being victims, it was understandable that they would not be fully conversant with the workings of the financial systems and did not have enough experience to spot potential investment traps when they came to make an investment decision.

However some of the proposals that were put forward to them were quite frankly ludicrous and it was quite surprising that a large number of people fell for them. For instance, in the United States of America there is a case of the notorious investment leader who defrauded the public of millions of dollars. He offered unrealistically high returns on investment. That should have set of some mental alarms for the people involved.