Madoff Speaks, Allen Stanford Returns, Secondary Market for Madoff Claims and Hedge Funds Sweep for Bugs
It is being reported that Allen Stanford, is being transferred to join Bernie Madoff at the Butner Federal Correction Complex in North Carolina to undergo drug treatment:
It is also being reported that Madoff claims that many of the large banks and fund of hedge funds who invested with him were “wilfully blind” and “chose to ignore con.” Here is a video about it:
It also seems a secondary market has developed for betting on how successful Irving Picard will be in recovering Madoff claims…
Finally, the Financial Times is reporting that motivated by continued paranoia (is it paranoia if the government really is out to get hedge funds?…) surrounding government oversight of insider trading hedge funds have begun to hire security firms to perform sweeps their offices and homes for electronic bugs (aka: listening devices). Here’s a video about some of the technology used in these sweeps including hidden camera detectors, fiber optic cameras, spectrum analyzers, and non-linear junction detectors:
So what happens when they find one? Maybe it would be like when a man named Yasir Afifi found an FBI tracking device on his car and asked the Internet community to tell him if he was being spied upon. Perhaps hedge funds familiar with reverse engineering strategies could similarly reverse engineer the technology and begin spying on the government – or would that be considered insider trading….?
Corgentum outlines the importance of recognizing a hedge fund’s operational stengths and weaknesses with Risk.net’s Operational Risk & Regulation Journal
The recent comments of Jason Scharfman, Corgentum Consulting Managing Partner regarding the enhanced focus being placed by investors on hedge fund operational risk were outlined in Risk.net’s Operational Risk & Regulation Journal in an article entitled, Operational infrastructure at hedge funds comes under closer scrutiny .
Topics outlined by Mr. Scharfman in the article include:
- Continued failures of many hedge fund with in regards to documenting operational policies
- Benefits of hedge funds emphasizing their operational strengths and openly discussing operational weaknesses
- The false artifical operational floor of Dodd-Frank legislation
- Inherent benefits of investors develop dialogues concerning operational risks with their hedge fund managers
The full article can be read on the Risk.net’s Operational Risk & Regulation website (subscription required).
Changing Landscape of Operational Due Diligence in Alternative Investments: Corgentum
It has been announced that Corgentum Consulting Managing Partner, Jason Scharfman will moderate a panel at an event entitled, The Changing Landscape of Alternative Investments and what opportunities lie ahead? at the Opal Investment’s Consultant Forum Midwest.
It is expected that Mr. Scharfman will discuss the developing role of operational due diligence, considerations for integrating operational risk into the asset allocation process, and techniques for family offices to integrate operational due diligence into their investment process.
The event will take place on December 2, 2010 at the W Hotel Lakeshore, Chicago, IL. To register for the event here, please click here.
