Frank in my books conned and deceived is the same.
Frank in my books conned and deceived is the same.Sorry but your argument falls down once you accept that the people in Storm were conned. People went to Storm for financial advice and were deceived. That's the issue here, not their motivation for using the services of Storm which you have assumed was greed. Incidentally, this is an assumption rather than a fact! The law doesn't work on assumptions although the CBA resolution scheme seems to be one exception.
There is no excuse for conning thousands of elderly people out of their life savings! If people in our society can condone such behavior, then I'm afraid they are as morally bankrupt as the rogues that are in the dock.
At the end of the day this is about wrongdoing, pure and simple. I can just see the Judge's face if one of the lawyers from the Banks were to stand up and say, "The fact of the matter, my lord, is that these people that invested in Storm were just plain greedy and should have known that financial advisers and banks can't be trusted! After all, common sense and history tells us that greed is good! My clients (the banks) just acted on their primal instincts! After all, why do old people need money at their age? They'll all be dead shortly anyway!"
Silly? Exactly! So let's stay focused on what really happened rather than make it up as we go along!
You're assuming that the adviser you hired to investigate Storm did their job the way you expected them to (I see a pattern forming here). There are two possibilities - One is that, now hold on, this might come as a shock to you - the other adviser didn't do their job properly. The other possibility is that the other adviser didn't understand that you thought this was a conservative strategy.
Honestly Frank, what do you stand to gain from convincing other people that it's impossible to determine the risk involved in a strategy? I'm not asking you to admit that you should have avoided being where you are now. You've already explained why you shouldn't have needed to do your own research and I accept your personal opinion even if I don't agree.
Why do you feel the need to go one step further and try to prevent us from helping other investors monitor their risk level? You claim that it's utterly impossible for anyone other than a trained professional to understand the risks of borrowing money. Anyone who thinks they can is apparently "up themselves". Numerous times now people have explained the simple steps that can be taken to determine if a strategy is conservative or not. You have never once explained why you think those simple steps won't uncover a high risk strategy. If you can't explain why it won't work, how are you in a position to comment?
You are deluded if you genuinely think the banks that participated in the dodgy subprime loans, and the CDO's and CDS's that followed, were claiming it to be a conservative strategy. Of course it wasn't."Numerous times now people have explained the simple steps that can be taken to determine if a strategy is conservative or not." Perhaps someone should have explained that to the various Banks around the world that have plunged the world into financial chaos. If the Banks can’t get it right, what’s the use of explaining it to investors who for the most part will be seeking loans from them?
You are deluded if you genuinely think the banks that participated in the dodgy subprime loans, and the CDO's and CDS's that followed, were claiming it to be a conservative strategy. Of course it wasn't.
Any more than Storm's 'strategy' of having retirees double gear into the market was.
So your past business experience didn’t prepare you for Storm, eh Frank?Hi Bunyip,
This tendency to put self-interest first manifests itself in the financial sector (financial advisers and Banks) I believe, far more than it does in other service industries because of its very nature. At its centre investors assets act as a light that attracts the harmless and the unsavory that operate within. In my own industry, if we did not provide a service, clients would simply switch to another forwarder. Because we knew this, service was everything although we always ensured that the service was cost effective to both our company and the clients involved. Nobody gave us secret commissions or incentives to use their particular airlines or shipping companies, but rather any incentives that were offered were always passed on to our clients. A completely different mindset seems to exist in the financial sector. Certainly, my business experience was a far cry from what I have now discovered about the financial sector in general.
In other words, we had to put our clients interests first or we would not retain their business. We always worked on the premise that our service fees would give us the necessary profit to operate effectively with a decent bottom line, not an outrageous one! Clients knew up front what they were getting and we knew what we were getting.
The way financial advisers like Storm operated is something else again! I had no experience of such methodology because it is an alien concept in my industry.
Ethics and integrity in the financial advisory industry, it would seem, very much depend on the individual financial adviser concerned. Unfortunately, as we have seen over the years, many in that industry that have failed the test. To my mind, it is an indictment of the advisory industry and the way it functions.
Whatever, it is not something my past business experience would prepare me for! If it had, I wouldn't be in this position today!
I look forward to a change in the circular nature of the 'discussions' on this thread over the coming months as the court cases progress.
cheers
Maccka
The Commonwealth Bank has agreed to pay $136 million to compensate thousands of mums and dads who invested in Townsville-based Storm Financial.
The payment, made by the bank without admitting liability, comes on top of $132 million Commonwealth Bank has already paid to the victims of Storm's collapse.
The payment settles a case brought by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, which claimed CBA was operating an unregistered managed investment scheme. ASIC's case proceeds against Storm - founded by Emmanuel Cassimatis - Macquarie Bank and the Bank of Queensland, on Monday.
More.
Sure. Just petty cash to the CBA.Saves the hassle of extended court action. The effect on the CBA's bottom line? Minimal probably.
Relief for Storm Financial victims
Three years after the collapse of Storm Financial, there is some relief for the victims of one of Australia's biggest financial collapses.
The Commonwealth Bank has agreed to pay another 136 Million dollars in compensation to thousands of investors.
Lawyer Stewart Levitt of Levitt Robinson -- who is running a separate Storm class action representing about 300 victims -- said the settlement represented a "disgraceful surrender" by ASIC.
The Commonwealth Bank said the agreement with ASIC has been reached without any admission of liability.
Sure. Just petty cash to the CBA.
However, if I were a shareholder, I'd like an explanation of what this payout is actually deemed to be for.
Is CBA admitting it ran a UMIS, or is it 'go away money' because a drawn out court case would probably cost them the same as the payout and be more damaging to their reputation?
That link makes the story only available to subscribers.More from Anthony Klan & Jamie Walker @ theaustralian.com.au
"This is a fair outcome," ASIC chairman Greg Medcraft told The Weekend Australian.
"Many of the Storm (victims) are elderly and retirees and this way we won't spend years in court".
However, ASIC's decision to drop action against the CBA over its role in the Storm Financial disaster was seen by many as a cop out by the corporate regulator.
Lawyer Stewart Levitt of Levitt Robinson - who is running a separate Storm class action representing about 300 victims - said the settlement represented a 'disgraceful surrender' by ASIC.
Mr Levitt said ASIC's statement about the settlement - which was released at 4.22pm yesterday - was highly misleading in terms of the amount of relief Storm victims would receive.
Those investors introduced to Storm via the CBA would not recover 55% of all money they lost, but just 55% of the money they had lost that was borrowed from the bank in the form of margin loans to invest in Storm.
"This doesn't cover any of the investor's savings, any of their superannuation benefits or any money they were encouraged to borrow against their homes to iinvest in Storm" Mr Levitt said.
Asic were always going to surrender, they always do. But if anyone thinks for one minute that CBA are handing out this money because they are kind hearted - think again. One thing we will not do is roll over like Asic. The general feel from the Class Action is for the case to run its course so the public will know the real story. Then and only then will the opinions of some be changed.
I say thank you to Asic for holding on as long as they did because it enabled us to further strengthen our case!
Hope some more Storm investors will give us their response to this latest news.
"Storm Financial victim anger over Australian Securities and Investments Commission
ANGRY Storm Financial victims have slammed Australia's corporate watchdog for selling them out in a settlement deal with the Commonwealth Bank."
jjtebj12
I believe the term for this in the vernacular is "game on".
You are under excellent direction.
S
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