Comment by parasubvert
8 hours ago
The shareholders did not pay for the deception, even though they benefitted from it. There is no legal precedence for this kind of action because we have an SEC that is meant to root out deception in public companies, that was gutted as a result of the current US administration.
If the law was "you need to hire your own private investigators and external auditors to find deception in all the companies you invest in", then yes, shareholder liability would be reasonable.
So if I give $1000 to Boris the loan shark, and he consistently returns 50% year over year, I’m blameless because I didn’t investigate?
Shareholder liability is the only way to prevent companies from tobacco/oil style abuse of externalities. You can execute the execs and it will make no difference, because the same shareholders are there incentivizing the same behaviors with the same massive salary/stock windfalls. Someone will take the money.
The economy would fall apart if that was how investments worked.
Imagine if money couldn't protect you from the consequences of your choices.
The absolute horror.
> There is no legal precedence for this kind of action because we have an SEC that is meant to root out deception in public companies, that was gutted as a result of the current US administration.
Trump took the gutting to an extreme, but antitrust and investor protection agencies have been gutted for decades. The only thing that will draw actual consequences is defrauding or otherwise hurting other rich people - Liz Holmes, Madoff, Epstein or the Dieselgate scandal. But screw over the little man? You'll probably get some sort of bonus.