How to rob a bank | William Black | TEDxUMKC

William Black is an associate professor of economics and law at UMKC. He has held many prestigious positions, including executive director for Fraud Prevention. He recently helped the World Bank develop anti-corruption initiatives and served as an expert for OFHEO in its enforcement action against Fannie Mae's former senior management. He is a criminologist and former financial regulator.
---
TEDxUMKC Facebook Page
Twitter @TEDxUMKC
www.tedxumkc.com/
---
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)

[@EunaJ]

Dangerously truthful and alarming financial crisis one must understand and accept to protect our rights and build wealth-two thumbs up. Definitely recommended.

[@carlhopkinson]

In the old days it was simply called "Quick Buck Artistry". Take the profits up front, delay the losses until you are long gone.

[@mikesuttles4515]

The best way to rob a bank is to own one. People give you money, you give them a receipt.

[@salemomar5130]

Well, think about the first bank ever. Their scheme was to take gold and give you a piece of paper which later they made it currency. Hint: the Rothschild family empire. These are the real richest people you don't see on a list.

[@SteveSmekar-ll6ln]

So sweet I can taste it.

[@jayrama8769]

that's because the wealth is spread out throughout the family, the family is rich, not just one person

[@groundzero5940]

Mike Suttles

[@colinroach7815]

Mike Suttles......... You said it best family, can't beat that. Well said !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@zapfanzapfan]

Very interesting! Put this guy in charge of consumer protection!

[@jwalseth]

Even after all the exposes and dramatizations, this talk is revelatory. I want responses from regulators, bankers and most of all prosecutors to this.

[@davidfeld22]

William Black knows his shit. The three point plan at the end is exactly what Bernie Sanders says at every speech. He doesn't use sophisticated financial jargon, but hits ALL the high points.

[@stephenpavlov8942]

Yes. The government can fix everything! The same government that has been shown to be corrupt.

[@watching99134]

@@stephenpavlov8942 You're a muppet

[@luchpockets]

That was fantastic, now just how do we send these Bankers to prison asap ?!

[@lawrencedavid5520]

Thumb's up for all. Great talk

[@SilvaOnTube]

Perhaps the most disconcerting thing about this great video is that as of April 22, 2016 it has only 61,192 views and only 477 thumbs up "Likes" (actually 15 thumbs down - I guess there are a few total cretins out there). Look around. There is vast ignorance and indifference. Humanity is sickening.

[@rustalisin8950]

ENRON / Lehman Bros & the unregulated financial instruments caused the fraud run among the lenders.. Why did B of Am bail out Merrill Lynch (on the brink of collapse) on a weekend deal prior to Wall St opening Monday morn ? The finance industry took a run Lair Loans from 2001 in the face of warnings from regulators. Hush money was stronger than US law, the lenders coercing big borrowers into inflated loans of every kind, incl Iceland governors to invest in WallSt futures /inflated value junk stock ..Take the money back from Liars profiting throughout the decade , the money trail is still fresh..

[@ymrbleav9577]

Your comment is so correct. It's a shame! The money should literally be taken out of their pockets. What I cannot comprehend is their are so many people in jail/prison for a very small amount of weed, and these white collar criminals are not. This system is literally screwy. It needs a major haul.

[@adolphus28]

As of 17th May, 2018, there are 116k views and 1k Likes

[@adolphus28]

Similar percentage of thumbs down ~3%

[@se7ensnakes]

I take a three point pledge: 1) I will never vote for a politician that have not addressed the problem with the FEDERAL RESERVE, WITH NINE ELEVEN AND WITH THE IRS INCOME TAX. 2) If i serve in a Jury I will never find guilty anyone who have been indicted by the IRS because I know that federal income tax revenues go to the banking cartel. 3) If I serve as a jury in a foreclosure I will automatically vote against a bank because i know for a fact that the bank loaned counterfeit money.

[@se7ensnakes]

Grandfather_Din_Racket I read all of those. a person needs to go further. For instance where does the income tax money goes. It is not what the government is telling us. I read: "What is funding government? Tax researcher Richard Standring believes the U.S. funds itself with loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF)."

[@se7ensnakes]

Grandfather_Din_Racket Due to our apathy we have given these international bankers too much money and they have turned against us. They are counterfeiting electronic money and we use that money to buy houses and to buy just about everything on credit. They control the information the public gets. The thing is that that the masses are greared to only believe authority

[@DavidByrne85]

se7ensnakes ffs....none of this has anything to do with the IRS or Federal reserve, man. The ball is over on right field you're running out the ball park chasing tinfoil floating on the breeze

[@DavidByrne85]

*Bill Black*: massive deregulation as part of a larger, sustained attack on the legitimate & necessary role of government in managing a state-capitalist economy has led, among many maladies, to massive fraud in the private banking sector *You*: Right!! End the Fed! Vote Rand Paul! Down with income tax!!

[@se7ensnakes]

Charlie Duran International Corporate / financial oligarchs run politics in America. They write the laws and they clearly have captured the government and the military from within since the 1900s (read smedley butler). They rountinely fund both sides of the war such as in Vietnam when we sold equipment to Russia and end up in the hands of the north vietnamese. They also control the money making process from private banks. These oligarchs (ruling elite, nwo, zionist, or what ever it is you want to call them) do not represent the American public. But they want to import their political /economic system worldwide because they have nothing better to do. They were born with all the material possessions they want and now take them for granted, 600 million private jets, 35000 square foot mansions all over the planet, yachts, and they party with 30,000 dollar bottles of cognac. All they can do is to conquer the world to make their lives meaningful. Therefore, this is why we have chaos in the middle east because they want to import a debt based petro dollar social economic system controlled by them. They already control Europe and Japan and now they want to take over the world. This is why these oligarchs are funding isis and why they want chaos in the middle east. This chaos is concerned for the Russians because of easily controlled jihadist. Really who wants to have religious terrorist at their border? This is why Russia form a pact with Iran. The question is: Is Russia controlled by these Oligarchs also? I think they might be

[@williamolsen20]

From what I understand from this, is that all these banks followed the Enron model.

[@happyhunter81]

outstanding!!

[@telefunkenyou47]

Leading financial donors to BOTH partys. You can't lose a dogfight, if you own both dogs.

[@michaelemmett03]

I just learned of this via the site Naked Capitalism. I was hoping the comments section would be in the hundreds or even thousands of irate citizens be now. Instead, we're now only 5.

[@pretorious700]

great tie!

[@blessingeison]

love his tie..

[@93jawani]

I was expecting a step by step procedure to robbing a bank. Dont judge me!

[@BruceRyanCannaCorp]

But you did! How about you & I set up a bank, say, in Antiqua! It is legal robbery. Take in a few deposits.... all James Bond. I have two account reps with legs. ZZTop style. THEN. Lend out 10x to our "friends" and all retire in the southern reaches. LOL Besides, one of those 'investments' might pay off 1tx... no foul. No fraud. LMAO

[@fatatomicsausage]

z716 HA HA, I was sitting here cleaning my gun and getting my mask ready. I'll have to say I'm kinda disappointed!

[@ve5618]

banks have no cash just get a computer, there's lots of sheeple to swallow what ever you offer

[@praveendeswal8855]

I have seen you tube vedio last 10 year but this vedio is my first vedio when I see this vedio I was stop mid time vedio and first time I am sending comment on you tube today I feel amazing and start something what I feel so that's why I am typing my msg only way ...............thnx

[@tonyb2509]

Must watch

[@MifuneBoBune]

If I knew an appraiser who gave a damn, I'd send this to him or her. Actually, all of this started in 1993 just when the market began to pick up after the late 1980's collapse. The new bubble is also over-inflating now. It probably won't take it 15 years to burst, however.

[@MifuneBoBune]

This is still going on today 4/2/24. The only difference is that the so called appraisal management companies are pressuring and blacklisting us. And, oh, liar's loans are back and have been back for a few years.

[@areslaou7028]

Cyprus, 2013.

[@vNeowned]

Did this dude voice Lester from GTA5 xD

[@And-gn6jk]

-_-

[@JoseSanchez-dy7sg]

Read his book!!!

[@Phil_Scott]

The tax compounding to ruinous levels is invisible, and there is no single entity to blame or target... its structural.

[@sexypoetry]

at 0:45 we are supposed to be impressed by the "look" of the number!!! look how many zeros!!! LOL...reminds me of Lennon's "now they want how many holes it takes"

[@geromino2007]

sexypoetry I was pretty impressed by the look of those numbers

[@sexypoetry]

geromino2007 i know, geromino....your grandpa sold america for less than that, of course that you are impressed now

[@GuyFawkesStillLives]

Bill, I endorse you and your Whistleblower's Group Plan.You need to be Treasury Sec.

[@tomboardman5694]

feel the Bern, Vote!!!

[@andrewdomenitz2970]

Can you say, regulatory capture?

[@Phil_Scott]

Taxes compound one person or corporation to the next.. and all of that money leaves the loop, eventually the net tax burden is more than an individual nets... thus the 4T/yr deficit.

[@andrewdomenitz2970]

Hey it looked like prosperity, so it must be good, right?

[@lessonsobserved]

For such a seemingly smart man he misses the most simplest form of preventing this fraud: no bailout. Fascinating that he made it through a 19 minute TedTalk and didn't even address it; none of what he proposes will matter if there is a way out - particularly a profitable way out.

[@Utubearchy]

Are you serious?! These vulgar criminals leave behind a sea of disaster and victims. And they would still take their ill-gotten gains with them. The goal is to have functioning regulatory teeth and to prosecute the perpetrators. That our legislators are in a bought, paid and lobbied universe and the national police don't have the wherewithal and actually fall to the deceptions of the crooks, are the problems with potentially other unaddressed ones. The crooks can't be allowed to exercise their activities in the first place. The implications are very threatening across the whole economy. Effecting such areas as YOUR pension.

[@pauldusa]

He shares with us, what's the system count's as legal fraud of the system around us all sheep, he's not God, just Moses.. lol

[@darkcynite]

***** This sounds familiar. I thought you might appreciate the video. I think regulation still lacks teeth.

[@doolittlegeorge]

What about Bitcoin? What about an ICO? There is no control therefore there is no fraud?

[@jackjackson3356]

Mr. Black is doing dutifully his work, yet the heart of the problem is that citizens and families all across the USA need affordable housing! Beyond accounting games Big Bankers play to have an unfair advantage that is $50 m mansions while millions of citizens are without homes! So who is qualified to review this social economic mess ?

[@BruceRyanCannaCorp]

Art of War. How about betting against the fraudsters really hard. When they fail.... eat their lunch, dinner and breakfast. insider trading at it's finest? Karma, hard core. Jail terms apply.

[@jkohutiak]

then why was I doing stated income, "liars loans" in mid 2000's?

[@feasealhanif2594]

u missed out how the bank system works?

[@DAWN001]

Recommendations 16:28

[@Aridzonan13]

Selective enforcement of a nation's laws, is the 1st sign of a 3rd World nation..

[@donaldf.switlick3690]

Money-in-Politics is The Cause; Everything else is a Symptom.

[@macrovigilance]

very good points. Taleb would agree with his solution of making banks smaller, no too big to fail entities - a system which is anti-fragile just like the restaurant industry. Even if McDonalds failed - everybody would still be able to eat at other places no problems.

[@pattysmith5989]

So glad William Black joined the #PresidentBernieSanders team!

[@r3v001]

Really enjoyed his talk but am puzzled by one thing, 15:30 why does he make a point of stating that they are African American?

[@KimNswati]

I was starting to imagine living in Hollywood, having expensive cars and all.....then the dismay and astonishment dawned on me. Politics, race, government and nothing about getting money Smh.......

[@r3v001]

Fair enough... I'll watch it again, with what you said in mind and see if it makes more sense, thanks...

[@KimNswati]

Let's try this again

[@johnnystockbroker5267]

Good point as that caught my attention also. It came across badly but I think the intent was to show that even more liberal politicians who are more left leaning are susceptible to this corruption. The narrative tends to be that free market capitalism is the cause but to me it's the democratic process which is broken & needs amending ie. the diminution of the influence of the SuperPacs etc.

[@BubbaLouis]

FIX THE AUDIO. The registration is off. Waaaay too distracting.

[@sdkee]

Maybe what we should learn from this is that fractional reserve banking is in its very essence fraud and it is therefore unsurprising that the people who engage in it will happily engage in other frauds as well. And that creating a system which encourages people with fraudulent tendencies to get the power to commit fraud and then expecting regulators to make rules to stop them is kind of a silly idea.

[@se7ensnakes]

Fractional Reserve Lending is much like having copyright laws extinguish to an exclusive group of businesses. Note this analogy. If video stores were allowed to make a copy from an original and rent that copy to another Video Rental store, and then simultaneously rent the original to the public. The second video store similarly was allowed to make one copy to rent to a third video store while renting simultaneously the other to the public. Soon everyone who cared to watch the DVD would have done so, and the video stores would have made a killing renting out cheaply priced copies. The effect is that once a person watches the film that person has fulfilled his/her need to watch the movie, but the DVD did not get expended (like gasoline or food) but would have continue to circulate in the community. But then who looses? The production team who labored to produce the film. Similarly money circulates in the economy from one person to another having an effect. If you have two conflicting contracts…one that maintains that you can have the money back when it is due, and the other where the money is loaned, then that is plain and simple FRAUD.. To clarify this fraudulent claim lets look at what happened during the great depression. There were rumors of an economic downturn so people decided to exchange their paper money for gold. The funny thing is that the paper money was a receipt for the gold as it read: “This note is legal tender for all debts, public and private, and is redeemable in lawful money at the United States Treasury, or at any Federal Reserve Bank”; and “PAY BEARER ON DEMAND”. BUT… When the public lined up to exchange their receipts they found out that the banking system/treasury/government had counterfeited these receipts so that there was a total of $71.8 billion of such receipts but only 3 Billion dollars worth of gold … See Banking and Monetary Statistics (Washington, D.C.: Federal Reserve System, 1943), pp. 544-45, 409, and 346-48.

[@sdkee]

se7ensnakes I understand the "logic" of fractional reserve banking. I also understand that all fractional reserve banks simultaneously promise to deliver on demand all deposits and all loans. This is impossible. It the deposits + loans are more than the cash on hand then there is no possibility of this. This is the essence of a bank run, which I am sure you have at least heard of. Outside of a bank run, there is no reason for the bank to just keep making more loans against the same deposits. The bank gets more interest from loans, but doesn't have to get more capital. They just "print money" by loaning more. If you are a bank and have $200, then you can loan somebody $1,000,000,000 because you estimate that the likelihood of the original depositor asking for his $200 back at that same time that the recipient of the loan also asks for the same $200 is really low. You have equations to prove it.

[@se7ensnakes]

sdkee you are hopeless. Fractional reserve lending is a myth, and not supported by empirical data. Banks are not using deposits of any kind to make loans. What they are doing is taking someone signature and creating a promissory note. That promissory note is a negotiable instrument which is the same as a FIAT MONEY. The bank are merely converting this fiat money to an accepted form of money so that people can go around and buy things. when commercial banks create money it is horizontal money as oppose to vertical money. The type of money the banks create is destroyed once the debtor pays it back or defaults on it. This is why the great recession is also called the GREAT CONTRACTION. Money is destroyed and this is why banks go bankrupt.

[@sdkee]

+se7ensnakes Um. I am against fractional reserve. Maybe you didn't read far enough. Cheers.

[@se7ensnakes]

sdkee I would be against fractional reserve lending, except that is not what is happening. commercial banks are NOT using fractional reserve lending NOR is there a multiplicity effect. If you learned that from Econ 101 in a college classroom you should ask for your money back.

[@nirvanaurantian6834]

I not sure you understand.

[@SuperTruthful]

this debacle occurred under bush!

[@lanadellhatestheclock3325]

I have been a banker for decades. Look back to Reagan. And Clinton.

[@ShmuelWeintraub]

ST: It happened during the Bush administration... but it began many years before. Clinton's decision to repeal Glass Steagall was the defining moment at which the collapse became inevitable, but the S&L crisis and bailout in the 1980s was really a dry run for the 2008/09 swindle. Unless many of the bankers and other professionals who lead this fraud are jailed (and financially ruined... a 3 year sentence in a country club when you know you are coming out to hundreds of millions or billions in ill gotten gains is meaningless) it will happen again. Wouldn't we all commit crimes if the penalty was.... nothing at all?

[@jonathandecosta681]

Nothing be end lost except for intelligent life on this planet. University graduates explaining how to play monopoly in the real world. And the high school graduates are looking on in awe as ignorance spreads in abundance. Everyone is lost on this planet.

[@watching99134]

This is why I support the nationally-unelectable Elizabeth Warren, she's the only pol who takes on the unsexy topic of financial regulation (along with Wyden in the Senate and Tlaib and some others in the House maybe?) American elections are like high school popularity contests and the media plays a big part in that.

[@part380]

So . . . profits are bad? In a free market profits are a signal for more competition. Perhaps it was excessive regulations and the government's "nudge" allowing "liar loans" that resulted in the Great Recession . . .

[@stevenhail2837]

He is obviously not saying that. He is saying that theft is a bad idea. Clearly you think the answer to inadequate regulation is no regulation. I recommend you to listen again.

[@swordarmstudios6052]

Regulation is always going to be 'inadequete' when something goes wrong, and something always goes wrong. He is right. Fannie and Freddie backed most of the loans in this country. I feel like we focus on the wrong part of the equation. Specifically, we worry about how banks and institutions respond to the bubble (badly), instead of worrying about how the bubble got created in the first place. It's not as partisan as it might sound. Obama himself has mentioned on more than one occassion that a single goverment entitiy backing 75%+ of the loans in a marketplace is not a good idea generally. Markets work best when power is distributed. In this case, the goverment had the power to create lots of consumers who otherwise wouldn't be consumers. This increased prices, and speculaters responded to the price signals. When price Signals lie about actual demand, all kinds of bad shit happens down stream. That isn't to say there wasn't fraud and abuse. There totally was. But regulation wouldn't have prevented a bubble. The bubble was a property of the market intrinsically, and you can't regulate away bubbles based on a physical product when a physical product is being over produced.

[@TheZeroBoard]

but in the housing market the overproduction was a result of fraud in the first place ... as was the case in overproduction of office buildings in Texas in the 1980s (though the details of the fraud were different, but they were both caused by fraudulent practices)

[@swordarmstudios6052]

Mel Bernstine I don't beleive that was the case. The overproduction happened on a national level, in response to pricing support for housing. House pricing was going up for decades,instead of going up and down more naturally based on natural demand. So much so, that the pricing models that weren't fraudulent basically still showed housing as a much safer bet than it should have been. Simply put, prefential tax treatment of mortage debt, along with goverment incentives designed to encourage lending to sub-prime buyers warped the market incentives of even good actors. This caused a slow inflation of housing prices above what they should have been on the basis of demand. Many people acted compeltely and 100% rationally, and yet they still managed to crash the entire market. So sure, fraudelent people eventually caused the crash, but the bubble existed long before that. The fact is, the prices of houses were lying to people. You don't need fraud to crash a market. You only need a price that isn't real. I feel like people want to make this into a 'moral' issue, as if insufficent punishment of bad actors was the problem. I submit to you, that even with a perfect regulatory state, we still would have had a crash, because the bubble didn't get inflated in a void ... bubbles have inputs. We should stop the inputs. I don't have a problem with going after fraud, but imagining that fraud prevention alone can prevent a crisis like this is probally not accurate, especially given the fact that regulators themselves are not seperate from the system that they regulate and can't be trusted to be 100% virtous or intelligent either.

[@TheZeroBoard]

yes .... but ... didn't the real bubble come as a result of fraudulent lending ... the other elements you speak of laid the groundwork, but the liar's loans and the securitizing of them were the dynamite

[@gabeartist]

This is why we need Bernie. #feelthebern

[@melissaanderson821]

Stop... greedy people and so I can see part of the new normal

[@wheatonna]

What is the "Tea Party definition of the crisis" ? When did members of the Tea Party express the idea that this crisis was "conceived without sin" ? He loses me there. By the way, was there a prominent case of a hairdresser being prosecuted for a liar's loan?

[@javkiller]

He was using metaphors.

[@molecule7202]

the tea party was taken away from Paul and it became a political black op for the pentagon ... pentagon black ops are conceived without sin (as in only the chosen et al) ... pentagon is a military front for wall st ... as smedley butler said, it's a racket

[@syolyah4356]

The fact that the Federal Reserve needs to go bye bye is all the more obvious to any thinking person. Anyone who seriously thinks that any DemocRat (actually Socialist/Communist) candidate will make this situation any better is only kidding him/herself.

[@jan-martenspit3383]

your statements devoid of any argument, but loaded with innuendo. you will have to do better thinking, the relevant organ is actually not in your belly.

[@achalacharya]

WILLIAM BLACK FOR PRESIDENT!!! WAKE UP AMERICA!!!

[@anuragprasad6116]

Nope. Not what I was looking for.

[@rscottenglish]

Who are the "hairdressers"?

[@rscottenglish]

Thanks Ayub!

[@minni1094]

Why is nobody in the political circles paying this guy any attention?

[@escapefelicity2913]

fix your audio

[@ExtraordinaryLiving]

Yea, soooo hard to listen to him talk due to the horrible audio quality, therefore impeded much of my comprehension ... and it sounded like blah, blah, blah even though he had something great to say!

[@MrAram562]

He's lying .Banks don't loan money.They have none.Lawful money is gold and silver.

[@annebritraaen2237]

Good luck buying groceries with that.

[@kennethroberts4725]

Reference is made to the fact that the President is "African-American" and the attorney general is "African-American". Why was this relevant?

[@jgrzinich]

I think he meant to emphasize the fact that it makes no difference what color our elected officials are, they still are allowing crimes involving racial tactics, like using minorities as direct targets for fraudulent sub-prime mortgages.

[@stephenpavlov8942]

This guy is a classic authoritarian. Regulation is not needed to keep the banks honest. Real consequences are . The government prevented those consequences from occurring which would have kept the banks ethical.

[@watching99134]

So what's your plan for making sure there are consequences?

[@tonyb2509]

Must watch