Thursday, April 22, 2010

CIBC exposed in defrauding elderly clients

From Maisonneuve Magazine, comes this fearless article to illustrate complete failure in Canada to regulate and protect investors. The story speaks to a captured culture of deceit that Canadians should be aware of to protect themselves against predatory financial behaviors.
"The Incredible True Story Of Mr. Markarian"




http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0BzE_LMPDi9UONzY5NTk3YjktZDlmZi00MWM3LWFlNDMtNTY1NDczZjk4Yzhi&hl=en

Thursday, April 15, 2010

I think there will be an entirely new industry created in the next decade or two. I call it the "industry of accountability", and it will be an entire system of specialties created to instill ethical behavior and integrity into a world which today is run on the premise that the man who lies the best wins. Or the man who steals the best wins. Or the man who destroys others the best wins.

Any number of situations, financial, political, business enterprise, all run the best by those who lie, cheat and steal the best. That simply must change. The industry of accountability is my hope for that change.

After our next great depression (which we are now creating) I hope that people in North America will have learned enough about letting foxes run the henhouse. I hope there is a huge backlash against people who choose self interest over the public interest. Yes, I know, we all do that, and there is no stopping it. But where it is done by our political leaders, business leaders, etc, we have the right to enforce breach of trust and negligence laws and put them in jail.

That is the industry of accountability. Instead of employing lawyers and accountants to help crooks to cheat the system, there will be an entire workforce of professionals employed in protecting the public interest, monitoring public servants, and holding them accountable and responsible for their lies and for their damages.

Just like today, we no longer accept and remain quiet about types of abuses. Just like today we question the Catholic church and how they hurt people. I believe that given time, north americans will have had enough of lying cheating stealing and "organized crime" by our trusted leaders. When we start to put these people in jail and take away their money and property, then we will begin down the road to a safer, more prosperous society.

That is my story and I am sticking to it. I am Larry Elford and I work in the industry of accountability. I am a financial investigator, specializing in investment abuses, and my work on behalf of the public interest can be found freely at www.investoradvocates.ca (industry tricks of the trade)
and

www.breachoftrust.ca (investment industry abusing employees and customers)
Alberta Finance Minister (new) Ted Morton, just cannot come any cleaner than his predecesor Iris Evans.

Ed and Ted’s Adventures


Recent news revealed a world renowned institution caught “protecting itself”, instead of “protecting its victims”. I see identical hubris with our premier and finance minister.


Over one billion dollars of Albertan’s money is missing in toxic investments. Two western Canadians are dead by suicide. You would think that Ted and Ed would be honest with the public, but no. They act similar to how my two year old nephew does when he has a bathroom “accident”. First try to hide it. Then deny it. Then perhaps put on an angry face of indignation. This forgiveable behavior for a two year old, but for Ted and Ed? It seems evident of persons who should not be in leadership nor trusted with money.


For those who are out of the loop, this investment paper turned out to be junk that was sold by investment salesmen, and the assets were then pledged to foreign banks (Deutsche bank in our case), in a complicated insurance process called a credit default swap. Not many people know or care what a credit default swap is, but imagine if you and your friends could buy insurance on your neighbors home. Then imagine if someone were to burn that home so that you and your friends could collect the insurance money. Apply that pathology to finance and you know the basics and the dangers of credit default swaps. They can be financial weapons of mass destruction.


$32 million of city tax revenues were lost in these by our city treasurer. Another billion or so from other Albertan’s.


Ed and Ted’s excellent financial regulators gave investment firms permission to sell this toxic junk in Alberta. It granted them permission to violate Alberta Securities Laws to do so. It has given several thousand such permissions without a single notice to the public. And neither Ed nor Ted is willing to tell us why. After all it is only billions of your money. Ted has not lost a nickel so why should he care? Ted now informs me that he will not answer this question of “why”. Nor will he tell why secret deals like this are done without any public notice. An accident Ted? Hiding something from the public?

Contact the writer at lelford@shaw.ca if you would like to become part of the solution.

Larry Elford