Bernie Madoff Business Ethics

Improved Essays
Lord Moulton claimed ethics is “obedience to the unenforceable” (CS). In other words, ethics are moral principles, rather than written and defined laws, that dictates an individual 's decisions and behavior.
In the corporate environment, ethics aids in the ensurance that business will conduct in a trustworthy and respectable manner so clients are treated fairly. However, with the desire and the possible underlying goal to maximizing profits, corporations often are faced with ethical dilemmas, such as Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, LLC, which was run by Bernard “Bernie” Madoff.
Madoff orchestrated a ponzi scheme for nearly 18 years by attracting investors, falsifying statements, and through the use of feeder funds. Bernie Madoff was a well
…show more content…
He used the “veil of exclusivity” to attract wealthy investors, as it was a symbol of prestige to be a Madoff investor (mag and britan). Additionally, Madoff used the “power of social feedback” to continue to attract affluent investors (movie) to fuel Madoff’s scandal. Early investors told other individuals about the profits of the safe investment, so they began to invest in Madoff. Donald Langevoort stated that Madoff was the least likely person to be a con artist and Gary Weiss claimed he Madoff was beloved on Wall Street (movie). In addition to Madoff’s trustworthy persona and prominent business reputation, he recognized what people wanted and found a way to satisfy it. Madoff offered people a “low risk, high return” deal that people could not refuse (movie). Madoff guaranteed a “steady one percent gain every month,” which constituted to approximately “ten to twelve percent a year, despite market volatility” (movie). The excellent, metronomic returns, as well as security and stability offered by Madoff were seductive to people and did not not originally appear suspicious. Madoff claimed he used a “split-strike strategy, which involved

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    Madoff Securities Madoff securities, is a company created by Bernard l. Madoff Investment Securities LLC was founded in the year 1960 by Bernard Lawrence Madoff, who happened to be also be senior executive of the company. Bernard Lawrence started the company using accumulated funds of $ 5,000 from his business that involved the installation of sprinkler systems for wealthy New Yorkers. In his five years as executive, the company accumulated a fortune estimated at more than one billion dollars. Madoff securities performed well with an annual profit of tens of millions of dollars. The company’s performance was considered spectacular and consistent.…

    • 1363 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    To this day, one of the most well known American swindlers and criminals of the administrative field is Bernard Madoff. The opportunist made it seem as though he was a caring nice individual that could be trusted, but the real truth was that he was a crazed and greedy criminal. It came as a shock to most people when he confessed to the crimes he had committed because he was a master at hiding the person he truly was. The people he worked so closely with believed in him and trusted him whole heartedly and he betrayed them by masterminding one of the largest investment frauds to ever be committed by one person.…

    • 1954 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Warren Buffett is a genius when it comes to investing and his portfolio rids all doubt. His success has made him quite a celebrity, but the business magnate is also known for his colorful commentaries and wisdom about money. Buffett has been open about how he achieved his success and often conveys important insights as to how he attained his wealth. TIME Investing reveals 10 of the most striking money tips from Warren Buffett.…

    • 74 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Bernie Madoff promised his wealthy investors that he could generate consistent returns on their investments while they would sit back and wait for the right time to cash in. Madoff’s entire Ponzi scheme was based on the trust his investors had in him and the profits he could bring…

    • 288 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Jordan Belfort Satire

    • 790 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Early on in Martin Scorsese’s new film, Jordan Belfort (Leonardo DiCaprio) cheerfully describes money as being like “mainlining adrenaline.” Belfort, the real-life rogue trader who set up Long Island stockbroking film Stratton Oakmont, is depicted in the film as reckless, obnoxious, and sexist. Nonetheless, as portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio, he is a very likeable character. We can’t help but root for him. Everything about The Wolf of Wall Street is excessive.…

    • 790 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Bernie Madoff was a master at impression management or social engineering. According to psychiatrists impression management has three goals. Ingratiation, this means to convey displaying certain positive emotions such as happiness to mimic good will. Intimidation to strike fear into the hearts of the people you want to fool, and supplication to get others to be helpful. These 3 qualities describe Bernie Madoff to a tea.…

    • 358 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Then October came and it was the worst market crash people have seen since 70 years ago but Bernie was still making money. He was smart because he stops buying from AIG and Citibank even though they were always in his basket. Madoff believed the banks were destroying he Untied…

    • 457 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Bernie Madoff Case

    • 332 Words
    • 2 Pages

    The facts of the case prove that he schemed $65 billion dollars from investors of all walks of life. One US Senator even got caught up in his scheme unbeknown to her that she was involved. She was under the strict life guideline that she would only spend half of her earnings and…

    • 332 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The financial indecency performed by Bernard Madoff changed the financial world forever. He is not only former non-executive chairman of the NASDAQ stock market, but the man to operate the largest Ponzi scheme in history. Upon further research relating the awful nature of a Ponzi scheme, many people after the ordeal were hurt and affected closest to him, especially his own children and the individuals following him around the world. This is truly the most deceitful monster like act ever done and most likely ever will be done, in financial history.…

    • 1177 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Bernie Madoff

    • 515 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Social Attitude of the Investment Industry after Bernie Madoff Bernie Madoff could be described as an ethical egotist, one who is heavily involved in an organization that does nothing but take advantage of others for personal gain (Bethel, 2015). As for his co-offenders, their personal values were more from an economic value orientation because they deemed his behavior as ethical and acceptable based upon their own financial gain (Bethel, 2015). Even today, Madoff continues to try to justify his action and writes about the loss of his two sons saying, “The fact that I was trying to protect our family by sheltering them from any knowledge or involvement in my wrong doing still fails to allow me to forgive myself” (Eustachewich, 2015, para. 6). In another interview, he stated his investors had themselves to blame because they were smart, savvy investors (Saulny, 2015). Sadly, Madoff’s lack of value, ethics, and poor judgement has led to him spending a 150 year sentence in federal prison for the $17 billion investment fraud (Eustachewich, 2015).…

    • 515 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Since a young age, Belfort had a natural inclination as a salesman making it easy to operate his meat and fish business in the 80’s and then, when that business fell through he moved on to sell stocks in ‘87. Belfort was not born into a well-off family, but he was poor and strove to rise above that by any means necessary. He only cared about himself, his success, achievement, money and getting his hands on his version of the American dream. With that intense determination and internalization of these American values, he built an illegal stockbroking business in which his company made millions off of defrauding investors (Biography.com Editors).…

    • 773 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    We all want certain things, and sometimes greedy people want more than others. Like just about everyone, I have been a greedy person, and have had greed. My greed is ordinary though it is my motivator to go to college, get a better job, and truly succeed in life. I believe greed is good and bad because it can bring out the worst in people, but others it truly drives them to just be successful, happy people. I hope to describe how greed is something that just about everyone has and what effect it has on others.…

    • 1299 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Many people bought stocks on margin. Many companies lied about their profits. Many wealthy people lost everything. Some people even committed suicide. Even millions of people that didn’t even own a stock lost their home, jobs, and even their farms.…

    • 862 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Wolf of Wall Street a portrait of people's lives that are full of capitalist neoliberalism and hedonic the crooks of Wall Street stock broker who served with the order slick cinematography, superb acting, clever dialogue, and packs tremendous satire funny, easy to follow, and never saturate, although the theme is raised not far from the world of economics and politics. However, as a deadly collaboration between Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio, The Wolf of Wall Street, may not be as dense and as serious as you might imagine The ΄Wolf of Wall Street,΄ and the capitalist system that he thrives off have one fundamental aspect in common, argues Giorgos Kallis: above all else they must keep moving at all times no matter what the human cost. The ΄Wolf of Wall Street,΄ and the capitalist system that he thrives off have one fundamental aspect in common, argues Giorgos Kallis: above all else they must keep moving at all times no matter what the human…

    • 807 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The Wolf of Wall Street Jordan Belfort Novel The Wolf of Wall Street tells Jordan Belforts journey as he embarked on one of the biggest stock market manipulation schemes and how it all came crashing down. The book details the demanding nature of being a stock broker back in the 80 's-90 's and the amount of sex and drugs that encapsulated a young Jordan Belfort into conning people out of hundreds of millions of dollars. After being laid off from his first job as a stock broker due to the stock crash of 1987, Jordan founded his own firm, Stratton Oakmont with his longtime friend Danny Porush. They then proceeded to sell penny stocks to gullible investors by training their employees to never take no for an answer and make the stock seem out of this world.…

    • 778 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Decent Essays