Chartered Financial Analysts have called for "unethical" bankers to pass industry exams to prevent another economic crisis. It comes after industry heavyweights let through cheats like Bernard Madoff.
This Halloween, the hit is the Bernie Madoff mask, complete with prison suit and hammer. It's too much for some, with one member of the public summing up the general mood..
"Yeah I was looking at it, but I feel if I wear it I might be attacked because a lot of people hate him right now."
Bankers, regulators and former NASDAQ chief Madoff lacked the industry's main qualification CFA, or Chartered Financial Analyst. Markets watchdog SEC brushed aside repeated warnings from charterholders, according to Richard Hainsworth, CEO of Rusrating.
“There were in the United States a large number of financial analysts who were ethical. There were more who were not. Rating agencies and investment banks, regulators who did not behave in an ethically proper manner. For eight years one of the members of the CFA Associations had written to SEC the Securities and Exchange Commission about Madoff, and his pyramid.”
The CFA's now on a recruitment drive in the Financial Wild East, where wrongdoing in Russia's exchanges is widely seen as endemic, with activities like forward running, where brokers buy a stock before placing a big client's market-moving order, and taking bribes for ratings. Rhodri Preece, Director of Capital Markets Policy, for Chartered Financial Analysts says its time to do something about it.
“We need more charterholders, more people who ascribe and annually attest to a code of ethics.”
The CFA grew out of the horrors of the 1929 Wall Street Crash. This crisis may put it centre stage.