A new Netflix docuseries details the crimes of the man who crafted a $64bn Ponzi scheme – and those who protected him.
Ego and a sense of belonging to the big club of rich fellas that run the world. “One of the reasons the Ponzi continued and got ramped up on steroids is his legitimate business was starting to fail, and so he used that Ponzi money to shore up his legitimate business, because he wanted to be Mr Wall Street. His ashes remain in a box in a lawyer’s office because the family refused to receive them. The SEC made rule changes, including in how the agency carries out inspections of investment advisers and brokerage firms. [came to a $2bn settlement](https://www.politico.com/story/2014/03/bernie-madoff-jpmorgan-104887) with government agencies over its relationship with him. Madoff was arrested in December 2008 and became the focus of public fury over the wider financial meltdown. The irony of this is he was a great innovator, and that certainly is why people trusted him. They owned a luxury apartment in Manhattan, an $11m estate in Palm Beach, a $4m home on the tip of Long Island and a home in the south of France. People who are very sophisticated investors, who should have known better, who should have known that a conservative option strategy can’t produce those kinds of results, didn’t ask the right questions. He also weathered economic storms in the 1990s and the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington. Madoff made history by launching Nasdaq, the first electronic stock exchange, and advised the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on the system. “What a waste of a man.”
What Did Bernie Madoff Do? Everything to Know About the Disgraced Financier Ahead of Netflix's 'Madoff: The Monster of Wall'. Bernie Madoff died in prison while ...
[Nasdaq](https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/nasdaq) in the 1990s. [financial crisis](https://www.entrepreneur.com/topic/financial-crisis) left Madoff unable to continue his Ponzi Scheme with investors who were scrambling to gather back their assets. Some of his most notable investors included Steven Spielberg, [Kevin Bacon](https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/how-much-money-did-kevin-bacon-lose-to-bernie-madoff/437025), and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel. "No one sees this as a great loss," said Jerry Reisman at the time, an attorney who represented a number of Madoff's victims. Months later he was sentenced to 150 years in prison. He pleaded guilty to several counts of fraud in March 2009 and was released on a $10 million bond. The firm traded penny stocks in the 1960s until Madoff convinced family and friends to invest with him, using an investing strategy called a split-strike conversion. He was sentenced to 150 years in prison and died 12 years into his sentence at the age of 82 in April 2021. "He cheated his victims out of their money so he and his wife ... So far, only $14 billion in recovered funds has been distributed to victims so far, per He stole from the in-between. He stole from the poor.
When it comes to Netflix docuseries, it sometimes feels as if there are only two types of people in the world: scammers and true crime villains.
(They've pled guilty to five acts of criminal conspiracies in the last six years, but who's counting.) "They just pay a fine and move on," said Chaitman. Or what about: How much scam content do we have to watch until we realize the content itself might be a scam? But the stock market meltdown caused a flurry of withdrawal requests among his investors, and Madoff didn’t have the funds to pay them all back at once. One of the most infuriating aspects of the Madoff scandal is how many opportunities the Securities and Exchange commission had to stop it. The SEC paid Madoff a visit at the time, but the officers they sent in were young, impressionable, and loath to piss off someone that could easily end up being their boss one day. [has](https://www.esquire.com/uk/culture/a39185198/the-dropout-true-story-theranos-elizabeth-holmes/). Madoff affixes the worst touchstones of the true crime industrial complex to the Bernie Madoff scam, which, in our mind-numbing era of IP content, has already been told by HBO ( [Wizard of Lies](https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/tv/a54006/madoff-hbo-wizard-of-lies/)), ABC (Madoff), PBS (The Madoff Affair), a handful of documentaries (In God We Trust, Chasing Madoff), and too many podcast episodes to count. Madoff goes out of its way to show just how many people aided and abetted Bernie’s ponzi scheme. [477-page report](https://www.sec.gov/news/studies/2009/oig-509.pdf) filed by the SEC’s Inspector General, the regulatory agency received “numerous substantive complaints that raised significant red flags ” about Madoff’s secret hedge fund starting in 1992. Then he spent eight years trying to get the SEC to listen to him. Perhaps that’s why Berlinger, a veteran of the true crime genre, felt he needed to dial up the drama. Instead, they argue, he was dependent on a team of people and enabled by a greedy and unregulated industry.
He pleaded guilty to running the largest Ponzi scheme in history, so if you're keen to watch Netflix's new true crime series The Monster of Wallstreet, ...
“At the end of the day, he’s a financial serial killer and the reason I say that is serial killers don’t have empathy,” he said in an interview with “One of the reasons the Ponzi continued and got ramped up on steroids is his legitimate business was starting to fail and so he used that Ponzi money to shore up his legitimate business because he wanted to be Mr Wall Street. During his sentencing hearing, Madoff apologized to his victims, saying: “I have left a legacy of shame, as some of my victims have pointed out, to my family and my grandchildren. According to Berlinger, the reason Madoff pleaded guilty to stealing $19 billion from more than 40,000 investors was not that he was remorseful but because he had also been managing a “significant chunk” of cash for organized crime and he was desperate to protect himself. “There’s no way you can look a widow in the eye at the Palm Beach Country Club and assure them that their life savings will be fine, give me your funds, I’ll take care of you, and then do that to people. Mark Madoff sadly took his own life in 2010 on the second anniversary of his father’s arrest. “The belief was that I couldn’t be doing this all by myself, that there had to be other people involved.” Ego and a sense of belonging to the big club of rich fellas that run the world. According to documents filed by the FBI at the time of Madoff’s arrest, Madoff had actually told his sons that all the family’s wealth and success were based on a lie—a huge Ponzi scheme that was crumbling under the pressure of the 2008 financial crisis. [TMZ](https://www.tmz.com/2021/04/30/bernie-madoff-cremated-north-carolina-death-certificate-ponzi-scheme/) at the time, his cause of death was revealed to be hypertension, atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease and chronic kidney disease. He was the former chairman of the NASDAQ stock exchange as well the chairman of his own company, Bernard L. Simultaneously, he and his wife Ruth and their children lived the high life, owning luxury apartments in Manhattan, an $11m estate in Palm Beach, a $4m home at the tip of Long Island, a property in the south of France as well as enjoying private jets and yachts.
Netflix viewers have heaped praise on new docuseries 'Madoff: The Monster Of Wall Street', with many describing it as "crazy".
Bernie could’ve made it with just his legit business alone. I'm watching the Bernie Madoff documentary on Netflix, and it went on longer and was more sophisticated than I thought. [January 4, 2023] Why he started his side illegal hustle is still a mystery.” The last episode is almost like a Shakespeare tragedy.” It also features previously unseen videos of Madoff himself, following his arrest in 2008.
Netflix's latest true crime doc looks into the biggest Ponzi scheme in history and the disgraced financier behind it.
[Netflix](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/). [Sign up for Netflix from £6.99 a month](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/tv-listings/). [subscribe now](http://radiotimes.com/magazine-subscription?utm_term=evergreen-article). [a statement](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/14/business/bernie-madoff-dead.html#:~:text=%E2%80%9CI%20live%20in%20a%20tormented,my%20family%20and%20my%20grandchildren.%E2%80%9D) after his sentencing, Madoff said: "I live in a tormented state now, knowing of all the pain and suffering that I have created. [best series on Netflix](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/what-to-watch-tv/best-tv-shows-netflix/) or the [best movies on Netflix](https://www.radiotimes.com/movies/what-to-watch/netflix-best-movies/). Madoff died of natural causes on 14th April 2021 in prison. In December 2008, Madoff's business began to suffer due to the global financial crisis, with investors asking for their money back. "Instead, those funds were deposited in a bank account at Chase Manhattan Bank," he said. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to the [Radio Times View From My Sofa podcast](https://www.radiotimes.com/audio/podcasts/). Netflix is also available on [Sky Glass](https://www.radiotimes.com/streaming-guide/) and [Virgin Media Stream](https://www.awin1.com/cread.php?id=489797&clickref=radiotimes-1763194&awinmid=6399&p=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.virginmedia.com%2Ftv%2Fstreaming). [terms and conditions](https://www.immediate.co.uk/terms-and-conditions/) and [privacy policy](https://policies.immediate.co.uk/privacy/). [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-madoff-arrest-idUKTRE4BB0JL20081212).
Bernie Madoff was the mastermind behind a $65 billion Ponzi scheme and a new Netflix doc explores his crimes. What to know about his life and death in ...
The couple lost $3 million when [Madoff's crimes](https://www.womenshealthmag.com/life/g29028290/best-true-crime-shows/) were discovered, the paper said. Ruth Madoff currently lives in a 4,000 square foot waterfront home in Old Greenwich, Connecticut, which is owned by her daughter-in-law, Susan Elkin (the first wife of Mark Madoff), the Post says. There, Madoff worked as an orderly in a section of the jail dedicated to educational programs, [CNBC](https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/23/bernie-madoff-earned-710-in-prison-after-ponzi-fraud-conviction.html#:~:text=While%20in%20prison%20in%20Butner,up%20dedicated%20to%20educational%20programs.) reports. “By all evidence, they felt bitter anger to their father until the days they died,” Andrew Kirtzman, author of Betrayal: The Life and Lies of Bernie Madoff, told the Post. Madoff's eldest son, Mark, hung himself in 2010, on the two-year anniversary of his father’s arrest. His sons then alerted the authorities, per Town & Country. [rare form of cancer](https://www.womenshealthmag.com/health/a41054975/clea-shearer-breast-cancer-essay/), in 2014, at the age of 48, the [Post](https://nypost.com/2022/02/26/after-recent-deaths-where-is-rest-of-bernie-madoffs-family/) reported. His two sons are also deceased now, as well. [tragedy](https://www.womenshealthmag.com/life/a42042587/texas-killing-fields-true-story-netflix-documentary/) in the years after his scheme came to light. Here’s everything you need to know: [sentenced](https://www.womenshealthmag.com/life/a39299534/elizabeth-holmes-now/) to 150 years in federal prison, per [The New York Times](https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/30/business/30madoff.html). [schemes](https://www.womenshealthmag.com/life/a39195993/sunny-balwani-now/) in history, which involved the swindling of $65 billion from thousands of clients, before he was caught and arrested in 2008, per [History](https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/billionaire-conman-bernard-madoff-arrested).