Throughout history, there have been many white collar crimes. These crimes are defined as non-violent and financial crimes that constitute a full range of frauds committed by professionals in business and government. These crimes are not victimless or unnoticed. A single scandal can destroy a company and cause investors to lose millions of dollars. Today, fraudulent schemes are more sophisticated than ever, and by studying: Enron, LIBOR, Albert Wiggan and Chase National Bank, Lehman Brothers and Madoff, we find out how the culprits started this deception, the consequences of the scandal and what our country has done. to avoid future scandals. In the 1920s, Wall Street was a very different place than it is today. There was a great lack of disclosure and a lot of stock market manipulation. It was common knowledge among Wall Street professionals, and even some of the general public, that Wall Street was a rigged system run by vast and powerful investment pools. There were loose regulations on insider trading and short selling of stocks, making it easy to take advantage of the system. Short selling stocks is basically like an athlete betting on themselves to lose and then giving up the game. The business owner or investors create a position where they can make a profit by running their business through to the end. For example, an investor borrows shares from a broker and sells those shares on the open market, that investor now has a short position in the shares. At some point, the investor must repurchase the shares from the market and return them to the broker. If the price of the stock falls, the investor can buy it back at a lower price than he sold it for, thus making a profit. This kind of action was not considered illegal in 1929, and Albert H. Wi...... middle of paper......the man after whom the project was named. It is also the largest investment fraud committed by a single person. The most significant effect of the Madoff scandal was the reform that subsequently occurred within the SEC, reeling from their failure to catch Madoff in the act during their investigation. The enforcement division was reorganized to focus on markets of greater concern and was staffed with a larger staff of market experts. The Office of Market Intelligence was created with the responsibility of handling the tips. The SEC began employing more undercover agents and advocating for a whistleblower protection program. Monitoring of back office staff has been put in place. Additional funding was approved for the SEC. Surprise reviews were approved to ensure the existence of declared assets. In general, the SEC's regulatory power has been greatly expanded to prevent similar crimes from recurring..