Comments for The World's Dumbest Financial Criminals Ever?

The World's Dumbest Financial Criminals Ever?

2009-06-17T23:18:48Z

Two Japanese travelers trying to enter Switzerland were caught carrying $134 billion -- yes, billion -- in fake US Treasury bonds in a briefcase. The forgeries contained 249 securities with a face value of $500 million, several "worth" more than $1 billion, and several "Kennedy" bonds, which, um, are just totally made up to begin with. What exactly is the endgame here, one wonders? As my colleague Charles Davi, who discovered the article, quipped: "Uh excuse me. I'd like to cash my 130 billion dollar check!"

And here's one of the most delightfully absurd paragraphs I've ever read in a news story:
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Had the notes been genuine, the pair would have been the U.S. government's fourth-biggest creditor, ahead of the U.K. with $128 billion of U.S. debt and just behind Russia, which is owed $138 billion.

The idea of running around continental Europe with 4.5 percent of US debt stashed away in a hidden briefcase compartment is, let's face it, so dumb it's awesome. So here's something fun. Using 2008 Treasury Department data (which has slightly different numbers for Russia and the UK) I've graphed where these morons would fall on a comparison of US debt owners.

And just to be immature about it, here's one more to print out and share with friends:

Comment from Mark on 2009-06-17

2009-06-18T02:04:36Z

134 Billion Yen equals 1,400,733,096.63 USD. Probably these guys wanted to steal a billion dollars but forgot that it takes 95 yen to equal 1 USD. For them, 134 billion is not an inordinately big number. Their 1 billion dollar bearer bond would only be worth $10 million. Not a huge amount if you wanted to sell it or use it to back a loan.

Comment from Derek Thompson on 2009-06-17

2009-06-18T02:41:08Z

That's not a bad stab at it, Mark. I appreciate your attempt to rationalize utter stupidity, but in this case I think it's a bit like trying to melt an iceberg with your breath.

Comment from ed on 2009-06-18

2009-06-18T14:43:26Z

This is what the lack of an MBA from a top university will get you.

When I got my MBA from the University of Moscow, they ALWAYS stressed that you should keep the figure below 10 Million when printing up phony bonds. I've found that to be quite helpful throughout my career.

Comment from Claudius on 2009-06-18

2009-06-18T18:57:02Z

Derek--

These guys apparently forged $134 billion in U.S. bearer bonds, essentially a form of cash. The U.S. hasn't issued this type of bond since the early 1980's.

And they may not have been as stupid as they seem--it's unclear just how many of these old bearer bonds are still floating around. Treasury, in declaring the seized documents as fake, estimated that there was at least $100 billion in bearer bonds still unredeemed, though other estimates are below that. So the Japanese guys may have been trying to con people into believing they had corralled the unredeemed notes. They just executed the job poorly.