Madoff Victims and the Securities Investor Protection Corporation

The New York Times online has an article on how Madoff Victims may be compensated.  Included is a brief discussion of the Securities Investor Protection Corporation or SIPC.   The SIPC may be the only source of relief for some of the victims, and unfortunately, many of the elderly victims may not be eligible for SIPC relief.  From the New York Times Article:

The approach they seek would produce a significantly higher tally of cash losses than the formula being used by the court-appointed trustee overseeing the claims process for the Securities Investor Protection Corporation, a government-chartered agency financed by the brokerage industry….

Customers who qualify are eligible for up to $500,000 in immediate compensation from SIPC. Those whose eligible losses exceed that amount would divide up the assets recovered by the trustee.

Thousands of long-term investors, including elderly people who lived for decades on withdrawals from their Madoff accounts, do not qualify for SIPC payments because they withdrew considerably more over time than they originally entrusted to Mr. Madoff, Barry Lax, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said.

The SIPC is like the FDIC for securities investors.  It is a government mandated, non-profit insurance company set up to protect the accounts of securities investors.  However, unlike the FDIC, it is not a federal agency, but a self-funded corporation.  Although it is not administered by the government, government officials play a role in that some of its governors are appointed by the President of the United States, under the bill that orginally created the corporation.  Generally, investors are insured for up to $500,000 per account.   Most of the securities traded on Wall Street are covered, however, failure to execute  trades transacted under naked short selling are not.