NotionsCapital: Happy Enron Anniversary, Wendy Gramm

By Mike Licht



Eighth anniversaries are “Bronze Anniversaries,” and there have been few events more brazen than the collapse of the Enron Corporation. It happened eight years ago, and this ground breaking cataclysm would not have been possible without the assistance of Wendy Gramm, PhD.

As Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), Dr. Gramm ended governmental oversight of energy derivatives traded by Enron and other companies.

Six days after leaving government, she was named to the Enron board of directors, where she headed the Audit Committee and was paid a million or two by the rogue corporation.

Dr. Gramm’s husband, Senator Phil Gramm, sponsored the Commodity Futures Modernization Act, which contained a clause making his wife’s regulatory decision law and deregulating new financial instruments such as credit swaps.

This undermined the financial system and enabled oil and energy speculation. Though he says he did not add the “Enron Loophole” himself, Enron had contributed $97,000 to Senator Gramm’s political campaigns.

Enron’s leadership manipulated the market, looted the corporation, and misrepresented company assets, with the complicity of its outside accountants.

Results: Collapse of the huge corporation and the accounting firm, billions in losses to investors and consumers, 30,000 Enron employees out of work with worthless retirement accounts. The resulting litigation lasted until this month.

Wendy Gramm continues to teach doctrinaire deregulation at a Virginia university; her husband works for a Swiss bank.

Rightardia comment: Have Americans forgottien the 'good old days." As of 2009, Gramm is employed by UBS AG as a Vice Chairman of the Investment Bank division. UBS AG recently settled with the IRS for $780 million. UBS AG and had been marketing tax-evasion strategies to 52,000 wealthy Americans.

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

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Deal may in the works with UBS Bank in Switzerland

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Sunday, July 12, 2009
WWW.USDOJ.GOV
(202) 514-2007
TDD (202) 514-1888

The Department of Justice, UBS and the Swiss government have requested a stay with a rescheduled hearing date of Aug. 3, 2009. The proceedings should enforce the summons ordering UBS to turn over records of account holders in the biggest tax evasion case in the US. It is believed that US $20 billion was deposited in UBS to avoid federal income tax. The stay was requested in order to provide the parties additional time to discuss a possible alternative resolution of the matter.

The parties have agreed that any alternative resolution reached would necessarily include a provision requiring UBS to provide the Internal Revenue Service information on a significant number of individuals with UBS accounts. If an alternative resolution is not reached, the Department of Justice will continue to vigorously pursue enforcement of the summons through
the court.

The IRS developed a special program to allow the UBS tax evaders to come clean to avoid jail time. Former Republican Senator Phil Gramm was an executive and lobbyist for UBS. Gramm was also identified as one of the key figures in the US finacial meltdown.

Source: DOJ

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