Yesterday, the New York Times, quoting their usual "unnamed sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity," reported that federal prosecutors do not expect to file criminal charges against MF Global CEO Jon S. Corzine or any other top MFG officials because they could only find evidence of incompetence, not criminality. Apparently there is no penalty for stupidity in the loss of over $1 billion of customer funds. In this day of electronic transfer of money, no one seems to be able to trace the computer click that sends funds from one IP address to another. Corzine himself says he has no idea how a billion dollars walked out the door unnoticed and doesn't know where any of the money is.
After examining all the evidence for 10 months, Obama's federal prosecutors could find no evidence of criminal activity. But there are too many dots to connect for this story to die. The futures brokerage industry has long considered segregated customer funds sacrosanct. Under Corzine's direction, those customer funds were used to offset losses in MFG's massive investment in European debt. Corzine was considered an investment genius by Democrats. The video below, shows an embarrassed Jon Corzine standing on stage and sheepishly accepting praise heaped upon him by Vice President Joe ("They're gonna put y'all back in chains.") Biden in early 2009. Biden says that the first person that He and Obama called after the election for financial advice was Corzine. Could this be true or is it just Biden saying dumb things again? Corzine had already been run out of Goldman Sachs by the stockholders and out of the governor's mansion by the New Jersey voters. But Biden called him the smartest guy I know.
What's even more shocking is Corzine's status as one of Obama's elite bundlers. According to the official BarackObama.com website, Corzine raised over $500,000 for the Obama campaign in the first quarter of 2012 - while under investigation by Obama's justice department. Will the Obama administration actually indict one of its own top fundraisers? Will they really drop a case where over $1 billion of customer money has gone missing? If this isn't crazy enough, Forbes is reporting that Corzine is planning to start a hedge fund. Who's going to put their money in that?
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