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Bernie Madoff has died

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Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#311

Post by _zn02 »

slibhb wrote: post #122

I was always fascinated by how violently people felt toward Madoff. Madoff reminds me of a character in a Woody Allen movie. Martin Landau in Crimes and Misdemeanors. In Dosteovsky, the perpetrator feels real guilt, confesses, and finds salvation in God. In Woody Allen, the perpetrator gets over his guilt and lives happily ever after, avoiding punishment. In Madoff's case, the perpetrator dies in prison and his famil…

Of the three, Madoff killed no one.

Also of the three, Madoff was a real person, not a fictional character, which is probably where the comparisons start to fall apart.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#312

Post by dougmany »

ajcp wrote: post #221
seneca wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If a corporation is a legal person with inalienable rights (as the SCOTUS seems to have decided on) Please stop repeating this nonsense. Corporate Personhood is a legal idea, and does not mean a "corporation is a legal person". Without corporate personhood, you wouldn't be able to sue a company for wrongdoing if the guilty employee quit, or even enforce basic contracts. There are serious problems with corporations…

I think the (now deeply ingrained) confusion stems from a misconception surrounding the Citizens United vs. FEC ruling, where the majority opinion in part cited campaign finance restrictions as a violation of First Amendment rights. Since the Bill of Rights are protections of citizens rights, it has widely been misreported that this meant the SCOTUS ruling de jure recognized corporations to be citizens themselves. Th…

At the end of the day the corporation is still enjoying those rights. The majority chose to ignore the veil and freely pass along citizens rights the to association.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#313

Post by jcbrand »

hudon wrote: post #222
jcbrand wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won't be the real one, it will be a fork. Not everyone will accept such a change, so the original 21 million version of the network will still exist and will by many be considered the real bitcoin.

Sure, and I can try paying for gas with gold but at some point I’m forced to do what the herd is doing, and the herd doesn’t care about arguments of “sound money”, they’ll just follow whatever monetary policy the ruling class decides is best. The herd coming into Bitcoin as we speak implies a weakening of its founding values.

You can buy gas in a depreciating currency and save in something else, like people have been doing with gold for thousands of years.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#314

Post by shawnz »

graeme wrote: post #285
shawnz wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The distinction is that any investor can form their own opinion about the technology equally well. We don't, and can't dictate to investors what technologies they ought to consider worth investing in. The mechanism you are describing is the mechanism by which every speculative investment works. That's not what identifies a Ponzi scheme. In fact it specifically can't be a Ponzi scheme if the old investors are aware th…

> The mechanism you are describing is the mechanism by which every speculative investment works. That’s not true. Most speculative investment promise revenues if they succeed. For your last sentence, why would that be true? In the case of bitcoin, the early investors have been led to believe that later investors will need to invest. But this can easily be false.

> That’s not true. Most speculative investment promise revenues if they succeed.

That wouldn't be speculative then (at least not completely)

> For your last sentence, why would that be true?

Because it's not a Ponzi scheme unless you are lying about the origin of the returns which you are giving to investors.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#315

Post by jcbrand »

ForHackernews wrote: post #256
jcbrand wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real Bitcoin will be the one that the market prefers. Why is Gold coins more valuable than copper coins? Why is the original Bitcoin more valuable than any of its forks?

You're agreeing with me and the grandparent comment.

It's not some kind of vague consensus, just like it's not some vague consensus that gold coins are worth more than copper coins.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#316

Post by bumby »

etripe wrote: post #181
ryandrake wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corporations (which are usually the payer of fines for bad behavior) don't fear prison because they can't be physically imprisoned. You can't put Exxon in jail. And, lawmakers deliberately make it so damn hard to pierce the corporate liability veil and hold shareholders or directors personally liable for the corporation's actions. So, we need to both move more towards prison and start digging in to which actual peopl…

> You can't put Exxon in jail. If a corporation is a legal person with inalienable rights (as the SCOTUS seems to have decided on), but is intangible and immortal at the same time, what can you do? Any of the below: * freezing assets (=~ reclamation) * seizing accounts (=~ civil forfeiture) * suspend a business license (=~ locking them up) * introduce a revenue cap (=~ prison labour) * remove lobbyists (=~ losing vot…

I think this may create asymmetries between risk/reward for those (real) people making the decisions.

Think about it with a sports analogy. If I cheat and take performance enhancing drugs, there’s huge potential upside: I can drastically increase my salary. If the consequence was spread to the team rather than concentrated on the individual it encourages the individual to take that risk. Maybe the team would be forced out of the playoffs. So the team lost their (smallish) chance at a trophy but I get a (largish) chance to increase my salary. In rare cases maybe the individual becomes a pariah. Regardless, if the individual isn’t held disproportionately accountable it incentivizes bad behavior. I think there’s a reason leagues ban individuals for certain behavior.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#317

Post by qwertox »

etripe wrote: post #181
ryandrake wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corporations (which are usually the payer of fines for bad behavior) don't fear prison because they can't be physically imprisoned. You can't put Exxon in jail. And, lawmakers deliberately make it so damn hard to pierce the corporate liability veil and hold shareholders or directors personally liable for the corporation's actions. So, we need to both move more towards prison and start digging in to which actual peopl…

> You can't put Exxon in jail. If a corporation is a legal person with inalienable rights (as the SCOTUS seems to have decided on), but is intangible and immortal at the same time, what can you do? Any of the below: * freezing assets (=~ reclamation) * seizing accounts (=~ civil forfeiture) * suspend a business license (=~ locking them up) * introduce a revenue cap (=~ prison labour) * remove lobbyists (=~ losing vot…

Doesn't it have a different effect, though?

Let's assume you have a company like Volkswagen and the corporate executives have decided they play the game of not getting informed about some really shady business practices which are helping the company to earn good money.

Would it make sense for Germany to punish Volkswagen by any of the means you mention, thus weakening the company in relation to foreign car makers, vs. to hold all (or the relevant) executives responsible, seize all their assets, prevent them from working in any administrative position ever again, limiting their income to a certain amount. Like really sanction them.

The company would continue to run, shareholders would be affected minimally, the problem would have been corrected. Of course this is a blue-eyed look at it, but seriously, you also can't do the comparison you are making. They just don't have the same effect.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#318

Post by bidirectional »

finikytou wrote: post #304
bidirectional wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what I'm asking about. They specifically said trading desks at banks, Citadel is a market maker. But what's really you're just parroting baseless conspiracy -- Citadel is a legitimate business which provides a great service to Robin Hood users. Payment for order flow is very good for the retail investor, reducing commissions and improving prices, the recent episode of Bloomberg's Odd Lots podcast with Doug…

sure. they dont get access to all robinhood transactions. their trading algorithms do the work. if you know a few ms in advance the trades you can literaly make money out of it. and this should be clearly advertised when getting into robinhood. Your argument that it is to help retail traders to enter for cheap into trading is fallacious. It is exactly like saying getting into real estate nowadays is a no brainer due…

It's nothing to do with knowing the trades 'in advance', they're the ones doing the trades! Market makers like Citadel are regulated to improve the prices offered in the market place. A stock may trade for $50 on the exchange, but Citadel can sell it for $49.50, they must improve prices and they do. Part of the reason they can do this is that Robin Hood orders are 'safe'. If a huge hedge fund comes to Citadel and wants to trade a million shares in TSLA, they likely know something Citadel doesn't and will rip their face off. That's why Robin Hood orders are valuable, luckily, the incentives of the retail investor (buying a stock as cheap as possible) and the market maker (selling to someone who isn't about to pummel them) line up.

If you think Citadel and its ilk are bad, you should see the guys they replaced! Market making is as old as the market itself, the modern advancements allow commission-free trading, massive liquidity and tiny spreads, before you'd be paying commission and buying a stock for dollars more than you could sell it for. They're good for the market and it's a shame this crazy conspiratorial thinking (which is never backed up by any real understanding) has taken hold of so many people.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#319

Post by data_acquired »

_wqdq wrote: post #188
data_acquired wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To quote another Bernie, there's a fair bit of socialism for the rich in the US through bailouts when big corporations lose too much money/are too big to fail.

I'm not sure why you're being downvoted, as that's as true of a statement as almost anything. This weird, hypermasculine obsession with capitalism amongst this forum (and tech community at large) just perpetuates injustices.

Haha :) I've been on HN for 12+ years, and yes, statements on capitalism don't always go over very well (unsurprising given links to YCombinator). Although I will say that HN has a wider diversity of opinion on quite a range of topics than other tech forums.

Re: Bernie Madoff has died

#320

Post by foogazi »

qwertox wrote: post #317
etripe wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can't put Exxon in jail. If a corporation is a legal person with inalienable rights (as the SCOTUS seems to have decided on), but is intangible and immortal at the same time, what can you do? Any of the below: * freezing assets (=~ reclamation) * seizing accounts (=~ civil forfeiture) * suspend a business license (=~ locking them up) * introduce a revenue cap (=~ prison labour) * remove lobbyists (=~ losing vot…

Doesn't it have a different effect, though? Let's assume you have a company like Volkswagen and the corporate executives have decided they play the game of not getting informed about some really shady business practices which are helping the company to earn good money. Would it make sense for Germany to punish Volkswagen by any of the means you mention, thus weakening the company in relation to foreign car makers, vs…

> thus weakening the company in relation to foreign car makers

Now you are getting into too big to fail territory where applying the letter of the law affects the workers/citizens

Similar things would happen due to gross incompetence from workers causing and oil spill (Exxon-Valdez disaster)

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