Welsh pension scheme 'exposed to Madoff'
A Welsh pension scheme has admitted exposure to the Bernie Madoff hedge fund scandal.The US fund manager has been arrested by prosecutors over an alleged £33 billion fraud.He is said by them to have run a "Ponzi scheme", paying investors off with other investors' money.Now, the Clwyd Pension scheme, which is paid in to by workers in north Wales, has said that they have lost around £1.9 million in the scandal.Dave Bamber, assistant director of the fund, said: "The fund's exposure to Madoff is extremely small relative to other investors. "Nevertheless, the fund is very concerned that a small proportion of its overall investments may be at risk because of this alleged fraud Whilst any potential losses are deeply disappointing, they should be seen in the context of the much larger falls in the overall value of the fund as a result of the current financial crisis."Speaking yesterday, US president-elect Barack Obama said that financial regulators had to take some responsibility for the Madoff scandal."There's not a lot of adult supervision out there," he told reporters. "Whether it's in the political world or the financial world, there's a sense that anything's going on."
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