Participants in the Madoff investment scandal Participants in the Madoff investment scandal Investigators are looking for other participants in the Madoff investment scandal besides Bernard Madoff, despite Madoff's assertion that he alone was responsible for the large-scale Ponzi scheme. Harry Sussman, an attorney representing several clients of the firm, stated that "someone had to create the appearance that there were returns," and further suggested that there must have been a team buying and selling stocks, forging books, and filing reports. James Ratley, president of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners said, "In order for him to have done this by himself, he would have had to
Pyramid scheme product to hide their pyramid structure". While some people call MLMs in general "pyramid selling", others use the term to denote an illegal pyramid scheme masquerading as an MLM. The Federal Trade Commission warns, "It’s best not to get involved in plans where the money you make is based primarily on the number of distributors you recruit and your sales to them, rather than on your sales to people outside the plan who intend to use the products." It states that research is your best tool and gives eight steps to follow: Some commentators contend that MLMs in general are