CANADIAN MEDIA POINTEDLY IGNORE $500m PONZI SCHEME WITH CANADIAN PLAYERS

Notwithstanding that several Canadian nationals involved in securities sales have been identified as principal participants in an illegal trading scheme that is looking more and more like a Ponzi scheme, none of the major news or financial media in Canada has seen fit to cover it. This is unusual, especially since Caribbean media, in several countries, is reporting on the matter, which Cayman authorities believe involves projected investor losses that exceed USD$500m. I am surprised that Toronto and Calgary newspapers are not reporting it.

Is there an unofficial news blackout on the Cayman Islands Gang of Four scandal, and if so, why ? It may be because the financial service firms where these fraudsters work place large ads in their papers, and their management does not want that lucrative source of income to stop. Can anyone out there spell conflict of interest ?

In my humble opinion, the second reason is due to the fact that some of these same prominent financial professionals, who have been accused, by the victims, of fraud, grand theft of investor profits, and money laundering, frequently are contributors of financial and market advice in these very media. One wonders whether any print media, including its online versions, which accepts free content from contributors, is doing the investing public a disservice, when it ignores allegations of misconduct directed at its own sources of information. This is a serious breach of journalistic ethics, when media puts it own interest ahead of that of the public.

When civil litigation, and the filing of criminal charges, or the initiation of regulatory action, occurs, it is generally too late for investors to act to protect their interest. When media is aware, it is duty bound to report, early on, regarding any news relevant to its readers. Anything less should be regarded as journalistic malpractice.