Alternative Market Briefing

Markopolos Testimony - During testimony Markopolos announces the existence of another $1bln fraud, will deliver information to SEC Thursday, SEC criticized by lawmakers and Markopolos during testimony, Still a dozen unidentified feeder funds, Madoff said only brother could do audit, Lawmakers accuse SEC of impeding probe into agency failings related to Madoff, Madoff associate Jaffe appears before Massachusetts officials

Thursday, February 05, 2009

Opalesque Exclusive: During testimony Markopolos announces the existence of another $1bln fraud, will deliver information to SEC Thursday From Kirsten Bischoff, Opalesque New York : Harry Markopolos capped his testimony before a House subcommittee with the revelation that Thursday he would be presenting the SEC with information on yet another billion dollar Ponzi fraud. Markopolos, who said that he gift wrapped and delivered the largest Ponzi scheme in history (Madoff) to the SEC only to have the regulatory firm ignore him noted that this time, "I hope they will actually listen to me."

News of the existence of yet another financial fraud will likely keep investors on edge for some time, and may spark additional redemption requests for the looming quarterly 30 and 45 day notice deadlines many hedge funds have in place.

Randy Shain, Vice President at New York-based First Advantage Investigative Services and author of "Hedge Fund Due Diligence: Professional Tools to Investigate Hedge Fund Managers" told Opalesque about the shift he has seen in investor concern of financial fraud.

"We have certainly noticed an increased level of scrutiny stemming from the very public blow-up situations occurring seemingly every week." Shain said. "Interestingly, we are seeing the fear of getting caught in one of these situations translate to calls from smaller and smaller firms - the types of firms that in years past m......................

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