Bernie Madoff and The Wizard of Lies Part One

With the death of Bernie Madoff earlier this week, Mark and I decided to re-run an interview we did a few years back with Diana Henriques.

Madoff is perhaps the most notorious name in the history of Wall Street. 

By now we all know the story. Madoff conducted a Ponzi scheme that is considered to be the largest in U.S. history. Over the course of decades, Madoff stole billions of dollars from his clients and finally, amid the financial crisis of 2008, the crime came to a screeching halt.

How on earth was he able to pull it off for so long, when there were plenty of warning signs and whistleblowers who tried to alert regulators that something was amiss?

One of the journalists covering the scandal was Henriques, then a staff reporter at The New York Times, who specialized in investigative reporting on white-collar crime, market regulation and corporate governance. Diana used her countless hours of work as the lead reporter on the story as a catalyst to write the bestselling book, The Wizard of Lies: Bernie Madoff and the Death of Trust.

Diana had incredible access, including the first interview with an imprisoned Madoff.

Robert De Niro was so drawn to the character of Bernie Madoff as Henriques depicted him, that he bought the film rights to “The Wizard of Lies" and it was turned into a film for HBO.

If you’ve yet to see “The Wizard of Lies,” go watch it. DVR it, stream it, whatever the method, just watch it. It’s incredibly well done and stars Robert De Niro as Bernie Madoff and Michelle Pfeiffer as Ruth Madoff. 

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