The hedge funds are now in the government’s target zone. This is the indictment filed against SAC. The Justice Department has had the guts to go after some big guys, but the real financial issues of the American economy are not being addressed. Are these cases diversionary? Criminal Indictment of SAC The first page of SAC’s website states that it is available only by invitation.
The recent case in Philadelphia involved the health care industry and 13 million dollars. But enforcing laws against money laundering is now on the government’s radar and this is a good thing. Here is the Justice Department’s Report. US Department of Justice Actively Pursuing Money Launderers
In China, people are being bullied into obeying rules while knowing that others are breaking and bending them with impunity. They lose their land for less than adequate compensation, queue in clinics only to find they must bribe the doctor, and are frequently mistreated when they seek redress, particularly in cases of brutality or venality on the part of security men. Endemic Corruption in China
Women have been disproportionately underrepresented at the US Fed. Many appointments will be made by President Obama in the next year. Among the women ready and waiting: Christina Romer, Sarah Dahigren, Carmen Reinhart and Anat Admati. Let’s hope the boys’ club admits women. Talented Women Ready for the Men’s Club at the US Fed
Ratcheting up pressure on the Zetas, one of Mexico’s most ruthless drug trafficking organizations, the U.S. Treasury Department placed Kingpin Act sanctions on two Mexican nationals it said are are financial operatives for the Zetas drug cartel. They were added to a blacklist that freezes their assets and bars Americans from doing business with them.
The sanctions, announced Tuesday by the Treasury Department, came a week after Mexico captured the Zetas leader, Miguel Ángel Treviño Morales, and less than a year after its previous commander was killed. The two men added to the list, José Odilón Ramírez Perales and Ismael López Guerrero, are responsible for laundering and smuggling tens of millions of dollars, according to the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. The office has sanctioned dozens of Zetas and scores of other drug traffickers in an effort to curtail their financing by denying them access to banks and financial services with links to the United States. Los Zetos Press Release 
The man who leaked documents revealing the extent of US surveillance of electronic media, Edward Snowden, has been awarded the German “Whistleblower Prize” in absentia. He remains on the run in Moscow.
The award goes to people who “reveal grave abuses and dangerous developments for people and society, democracy, peace and the environment in the public interest,” watchdog Transparency International said on its website.
More about on our German side
Inkaufnahme von Verfolgung, Mobbing und der erheblicher Risiken durch den Whistleblower („risking retaliation“) muss durch Bürger geehrt werden.
How can women fight against corruption?
If you see something say something?
Designed Doaa Eladl
@wtwfinance
In a Ponzi scheme in Texas a man used new investments in virtual currency to pay off prior obligations. Nothing new under the sun. Bitcoins Have a Bernie Madoff
“The Death of Corporate Reputation” says yes and explains why.
The author, Jonathan Macey, provides three answers. The first is that clients increasingly value individuals who work within investment banks or accountancy firms more than they do the firms themselves. Select employees remain valuable even when the firms they work for implode, as was the case with certain partners at Arthur Andersen, an audit firm that went bust in 2002.
Second, for the most sophisticated edge of finance, firms are now often less important to clients than the customized products they merely assemble for buyers seeking results, such as the ability to hedge a particular risk. Firms used to use their reputation to become architects of deals; now they are just assemblers, and that has changed their culture.
Last, and perhaps most important, a vast profusion of laws, regulations and direct government interventions has provided a substitute for reputation, albeit a toxic and inadequate one. This is obvious in the case of deposit insurance, which ensures that Americans can now afford to be indifferent about the solvency of the institutions that hold their money. But it is increasingly true in other areas of finance as well. Requirements for ratings and audits, for instance, are now set by regulation, not the market, and an entire new federal agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, has been created to expand this approach in retail finance. Is American Finance Broken
Who has the best and largest bank ?
ICBC Honored “2013 Best Bank in China” by Finance Asia
The FinanceAsia magazine recently announced the winners of its 2013 Country Awards. ICBC was named “Best Bank in China” for the sixth year since nominated for the ranking. ICBC won the title primarily credited to its good performance, consistent reform and innovation as well as solid market position.
As the US economy recovered after the crisis, the rebound of the real estate sector supported the recovery of Wells Fargo.
Reduced expectations for China’s economic growth and a cash crunch that hammered the nation’s financial sector this spring—along with signs that the U.S. economy is recovering and the end of ultralow interest rates may be in the offing—have shifted those perceptions again. A long-awaited rally in U.S. bank shares has lifted the value of companies such as San Francisco-based Wells Fargo and J.P. Morgan Chase JPM -0.28% & Co. of New York…Two continents two perspectives
Warren Buffett fled after two years. Others are following. The reason: government dysfunction. It is impossible to get anything done in India. Running Away From Investment in India
