Dog Buns! read it properly. Yesteryon's title was "The Mathematics Of Misery" which is completely different. Okay, okay, mostly different. Okay, okay, somewhat similar. But completely different at the same time.
In case you were wondering, Conrad's brain is structured in such a way that makes the crafting of words very easy, as witness the five thousand iterations of BOOJUM! to date. Numbers, on the other hand, are very much a closed book and Your Humble Scribe is eternally grateful for living in the age of the pocket calculator. Art!
You're probably wondering what Bernie Madoff and a rotting cod cadaver have in common. Well, both smell fishy. Ha! Do you s - O you do.
ANYWAY let us re-introduce Harry Markopolos, whom we briefly mentioned yesteryon. Art!
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| He told them so |
Harry's involvement in the biggest Ponzi scheme ever began when he was but a humble financial analyst and fraud investigator in Boston in 1999. His boss told him about a huge unregistered hedge fund being run by Bernie Madoff, that was generating enormous returns. Mister Boss wanted Harry to do a bit of - well, actually a lot of - forensic accountancy, in order to analyse Madoff's trading strategy and revenue streams, so his business model could be copied. Big bucks in the revenue anticipated. Or so Mister Boss thought. Art!
That's the AI Image Generator's idea of 'Huge financial fraud'. Hmmmm thinking about the end result, not that far off, actually.
ANYWAY Harry explained that at this time Madoff was one of the most powerful and well-respected men on Wall Street, who had a lot of clout with the Securities Exchange Commission (who police finance in South Canada) and a squeaky-clean image. The very idea that he could be committing fraud was laughable. Laughable i tell you!
Apart from the cold equations. Art!
While people can lie, mathematics cannot. It took Harry all of five minutes to recognise that Madoff was a fraud, and then four hours to mathematically prove it. Harry, you see, is a lot of a maths nerd - qualified in Integral Calculus, Differential Calculus, Linear Algebra, Normal Statistics and Non-Normal Statistics.
What made Harry instantly suspicious was Madoff's hedge fund performance, because markets rise and fall, yet his hedge fund only ever went up. Either Madoff was doing insider trading, or he was running a Ponzi scheme.
Harry was not shy or reticent about this discovery. He contacted the Boston branch of the SEC in May 2000.
And again in October 2001.
And again in October 2005
And again in November 2005
And again in December 2005
And again in June 2007
And again in April 2008. Art!
By 2005 Harry had identified TWENTY NINE RED FLAGS. One glaring example was that Madoff's claimed 'trading strategy' would have required his fund to have purchased more options on the Chicago Option Exchange than actually existed in real life.
The SEC opened a case in 2006 and closed it a year later, stating that they had 'no evidence of fraud'.
Harry disproved this asinine conclusion by enquiring of financial firms as to whether they had done any business with Madoff? None of them had. Ever. Imagine that, using a phone to call people and make enquiries! Who knew! Art?
Part of Harry's evidence was showing who were NOT victims of Madoff - no firms on Wall Street ever invested with him, meaning that hundreds of financial experts knew his hedge fund smelled like a week-dead fish and wouldn't touch it with a barge pole tied to another barge pole.
Then there was the rather horrid revelation that most SEC investigators are lawyers with 0% financial expertise or experience, and whom probably have all the mathematical skills of Conrad. They could parse a contract no problem, but double-entry book-keeping was a mystery to them*.
Harry also revealed that Madoff was essentially running an 'Affinity Scam', where he preyed on groups of people similar to himself, initially Jewish New Yorkers. Since his Ponzi scheme required ever-increasing numbers of clients, he expanded his net to include Palm Beach in Florida, where he solicited clients from the membership of his clubs and social circle.
Bear in mind that, despite Harry's persistent efforts, the SEC didn't bring down Madoff. They had no investigation or case in hand in 2008. What brought him down was the financial crisis that hit in that year, causing a run on banks and other financial institutions. When his clients wanted to withdraw their money - Ooops! there wasn't any more than a fraction of what there ought to have been.
We haven't even begun on the 'Feeder Firms' yet .....
"The War Illustrated Edition 200 16th February 1945"
Kindly remember, gentle reader, that the photographs used in this publication were deliberately delayed for a couple of weeks, lest the Teutons derive tactical information from them. Art!
Calling Sal Mercogliano, calling Sal Mercogliano! He's the chap whom runs "What Is Going On With Shipping" on Youtube. Here you see what is classed as an 'Escort Carrier', a.k.a. a 'Jeep Carrier'. These were a lot smaller and less capable than a proper aircraft carrier, but if you needed half a dozen aircraft to protect your convoy, why they made a lot of sense. This one is loading up with grain, because that flight deck has been added to the superstructure of a cargo vessel. Conrad unsure how they'll get the grain out at destination.
This is the central pages' usual montage of shots across Europe, which I'll just leave up for now. More details later on, gentle reader.
More Of Matters Martial
Allow me to copy the illo that The Tank Museum put up yesteryon. Art!
The L1A1 SLR was the Commonwealth designation for the Belgian FN FAL. It only fired in semi-automatic, forgoing full auto in the name of accuracy & ammo conservation. It served with the British Army from 1954 until the early 90s, being phased out in favour of the L85A1.
This thing was an absolute beast of a bang-stick. It fired the 7.62 mm full-sized round that would stop anything it hit and do so a very long way off. Of course - obviously! - Conrad had to stick his oar in.
Popularised in the Seventies as used by U.N.I.T. and witnessed regularly on Saturday afternoons.
Not enough stopping power against Daleks, is the consensus.
Speaking Of Daleks -
As proof that everything is interconnected, I am currently watching Episode 3 of "Department S", which was written by Terry Nation.
Who invented the Daleks? No! Not Lord Lucan, Dougal. Terry Nation.
Where did he get part of the inspiration from? Why, when he went to see the Georgian National Dancers when they performed in London. Here's a couple of Georgians in their native Georgia, indulging in a bit of dancing. Art!
At no point do you see the lady's legs or even her feet, she just glides around as if on - well, castors. Congrats to Terry on turning this into a ruthless cyborg.
Finally -
It has snowed overnight and as a result the usual army of sledgers are arriving on Tandle Hill Road to exploit the slopes. Art!
A curse on them. What makes their experience even less pleasant are the roadworks and traffic lights installed at the junction with Rochdale Road. Good!
As for Conrad, I am going to be taking a stroll into Lesser Sodom shortly, so will need to don my stout shoes. Pool shoes not good in this kind of weather.
That is all.
* It is to me, I just threw it in there to sound as if I know what I'm talking about
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