Four-plus years after the financial collapse, one of the biggest scandals continues to be the utter lack of accountability on Wall Street, particularly by executives and officers who made billions in bonuses overseeing and directing the creation, sale and distribution of worthless securities throughout the global financial system.  Unfortunately, in some ways, that’s the good news.  

The bad news is that crime unpunished is crime undeterred.  Indeed, the total lack of accountability for the crimes of the financial crisis and the steadfast refusal to apply the rule of law to Wall Street actually incentivizes and rewards crime.  Sadly, the bad news is that much more crime is likely to come due to the failure to prosecute the crooks for their past conduct. (And, don’t be fooled by the SEC and DOJ press releases boasting about their “get tough” track record for prosecuting financial crimes;  it’s all PR spin and much of what they say would be fraudulent under their own statutes if they were making such public statements as a public company.)

Regrettably, that scandal continues, but there have finally been some arrests in the ongoing LIBOR rigging scandal.  I say “finally” because anyone who has read the emails or transcripts of the phone calls that have been released has wondered why there weren’t arrests pretty quickly of the traders and others that made incriminating statements.  

The Wall Street Journal has the story here.