Barry Ritholtz, Columnist

Meet Uncle Sam, Your Partner in Crime

Lack of criminal prosecutions for bankers, hedge funds managers and other moguls has altered the calculus -- huge fines are now a cost of doing business.

November 5, 2013 at 12:28 PM UTC

By Barry Ritholtz

Barry Ritholtz is a former Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is chairman and chief investment officer of Ritholtz Wealth Management, and was previously chief market strategist at Maxim Group. He is the author of “Bailout Nation.”

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The news leaked over the weekend: Hedge-fund baron Steve Cohen and SAC Capital Advisors were about to pay a monster fine for a decades worth of insider trading and failed supervision of traders. Some prefer the term "expert networks," but - po-TAY-to, po-TAH-to.

The rules have changed, and so have the penalties. The lessons of the post-crisis era are clear: