Where can you invest a million?

By now, anyone who has kept up with the news has heard of Bernard Madoff. And each week, another swindler (sorry, alleged swindler) is made known to the public.

Since the Madoff story broke, it’s been followed by arrests of others on swindling charges: Arthur G. Nadal in Florida, Joseph S. Forte in Philadelphia and James Ossie in Atlanta.

On Wednesday, all the television networks and online news outlets were covering the latest case, that of Texas billionaire R. Allen Stanford. Unlike most of the others, Stanford can’t be found.

But the case of Madoff, 70, remains the biggest. Once well respected in the investment community, the former Nasdaq chairman was arrested in December in what prosecutors say was a $50 billion Ponzi scheme to defraud investors.

For years, weekend and vacation casino gamblers, those who daily play Pick 3s, Pick 4s and Pick 5s, and twice weekly play Mega Millions and Power Ball, had to listen experts and non-experts criticize them for giving their money away. I wonder if gamblers now feel vindicated.

They’re told that rather than waste their extra money on lotteries and at racetracks and casinos, they should invest with legitimate and reputable firms. Well, it seems the famous and not-so famous did just that and many have lost everything. Investors that spread their money around – diversified – are better off but still lost piles of green.

As more and more fraud charges come to light, it makes you wonder just how widespread swindling is. It’s obvious that federal agencies responsible for protecting investors are undermanned.

In Madoff and Stanford’s cases, there are reports that the Securities and Exchange Commission had been warned that all was not right but failed to discover wrongdoing. One wonders if the SEC investigated at all.

The burst of the economic bubble is bringing fraudulent schemes to light. Time, I’m afraid, will uncover even more cases of bad investments and those who illegally managed them.

Those who lost their retirements are really in a tizzy. Investors young enough to keep working may recover. But those unable to work must adjust their lifestyles or completely overhaul them.

People who happen to have money to invest must surely be afraid to do so. In today’s climes, who can you trust?

Recently it appears that individual investment managers versus investment companies are the more dangerous option to take. Despite the bailouts of a few Wall Street investment companies, their types are still the safest route to take.

Oddly, though, state lotteries are showing an increase in sales. Experts attribute the trend to the state of the economy. Small-scale investors respond to ask those who call them crazy for betting on the lottery by asking, “Where else can you invest a dollar and win a million?”

Certainly not in today’s stock market.

Nelson Graves, of Augusta County, is a columnist for The News Virginian. E-mail him at .