Tuesday, June 16, 2009

FRONTLINE: Breaking the Bank

Frontline tonight had another great episode on the economic crisis: Breaking the Bank concentrating mostly on the Bank of America Merrill Lynch merger.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I know, not directly related, but seems like it is getter harder and harder to walk through the financial centers of Manhattan, London or Basel without bumping into someone who has run afoul of the law.

Latest news re UBS...


US: UBS must release names of suspected tax cheats
US urges judge to order Swiss bank UBS to release names of suspected American tax cheats
By Curt Anderson, AP Legal Affairs Writer
On Tuesday June 30, 2009, 3:04 pm EDT
Buzz up! 0 Print.Companies:Ubs ag
MIAMI (AP) -- The Justice Department says Swiss bank UBS AG must reveal names of thousands of suspected American tax cheats because the bank violated U.S. law.

A court filing Tuesday in Miami urges U.S. District Judge Alan S. Gold to enforce a summons against UBS seeking the identities of about 52,000 people. U.S. officials say those are mostly wealthy Americans who used secret UBS accounts to hide income from the Internal Revenue Service.

UBS has claimed it cannot disclose the names without violating Swiss law. But U.S. officials say foreign law and tax treaties do not shield U.S. taxpayers from liability. The court filing says UBS "systematically and deliberately violated" U.S. laws.


Of course, these UBS folks were only doing their jobs. It's nice that Madoff got 150 years, but I would just like to see prosecutions to the fullest extent of the law for all of these fraud, tax evasion, stock manipulation, and related schemes.