Behind Madoff's arrest

听力练习

The arrest of Wall Street legend Bernard Madoff has clients in a panic that their wealth may be gone.

The arrest of Wall Street legend Bernard Madoff has clients / / panic that their wealth may be gone.

It is hard to believe that somebody so successful who people trusted for years was so greedy and so corrupt to steal their money. It's / It’s remarkable, people who I've spoken to are shocked that Bernie Madoff, a trusted guy would steal their money.

Madoff, former chairman of the Nasdaq stock market, built one of the most successful trading firms on Wall Street. It was at a separate/, more secretive investment division located on a different floor in this office tower that he allegedly perpetrated the fraud.

According to civil and criminal complaints Madoff confessed, he had been cheating investors for years and he estimated his total losses from the fraud may have been 50 billion dollars.

"According to the criminal complaint on Wednesday, here at his Manhattan apartment, Bernie Madoff / confessed to his two sons, Andrew and Mark, both senior executives in the company. The father said of his investment firm quote/ " it’s just a big lie. It was basically a giant Ponzi scheme.”

Madoff allegedly had been using new investment money from clients to pay supposed profits out to other investors. Under the weight of a tumbling stock market, the scheme had collapsed. One of Madoff's attorneys said "Bernie Madoff is a longstanding leader in the financial services industry. He will fight to get through this unfortunate set of events.

Madoff is out on 10 million dollars' bond. He's facing a single charge of security's fraud which carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years.

For CNN MONEY.com, I am Allan Chernoff

NOTE:

Ponzi scheme:庞氏骗局是一种最古老和最常见的投资诈骗，是金字塔骗局的变体，很多非法的传销集团就是用这一招聚敛钱财的，这种骗术是一个名叫查尔斯·庞齐的投机商人“发明”的。　查尔斯·庞齐（Charles Ponzi）是一位生活在19、20世纪的意大利裔投机商，1903年移民到美国，1919年他开始策划一个阴谋，骗人向一个事实上子虚乌有的企业投资，许诺投资者将在三个月内得到40%的利润回报，然后，狡猾的庞齐把新投资者的钱作为快速盈利付给最初投资的人，以诱使更多的人上当。由于前期投资的人回报丰厚，庞齐成功地在七个月内吸引了三万名投资者，这场阴谋持续了一年之久，才让被利益冲昏头脑的人们清醒过来，后人称之为“庞氏骗局”。

文本参考中文翻译

华尔街的神话Bernard Madoff被逮捕，这使他的客户们陷入惊慌，担心自己的财产付诸东流。

很难相信，一个如此成功的人，一个人民信任了多年的人会这么贪婪，居然偷客户的钱财。很明显，跟我谈话的人都表示，他们非常震惊，Bernard Madoff这样一个值得信赖的人居然也会偷他们的钱。

Bernard Madoff是纳斯达克股票市场的前任主席，他建成了华尔街最成功的交易公司之一。在这座商业大楼的不同楼层还有另外一个独立的，秘密的投资部门，据称，他利用这个部门来实施诈骗活动。

经过民事和刑事诉讼，Madoff承认，几年来他一直欺骗投资者，他估计，自己通过诈骗赚取了接近500亿美元。

“根据周三的刑事案件审理，就在曼哈顿的公寓，Bernie Madoff向他两个同是高管的儿子Andrew和Mark承认了这一事实。引用他的话说，他的投资公司只是一个巨大的谎言。这只是一个基本的旁氏骗局。”

据称，Madoff用新的投资者的钱来支付之前的投资者的所谓的收益。由于当前股市崩盘，这个骗局也随之崩溃。Madoff的其中一个律师说，“Bernie Madoff是金融服务行业长期的领导者。他会努力挺过这段不幸的历史。”

Madoff拥有1000万美元的债券。仅警方起诉诈骗这一项罪行，最高可判处其20年有期徒刑。