CD Rates News: All Stanford Edition

The big story in CD Rates news this week is The SEC's case against Stanford's Certificates of Deposit, and how that is affecting investors. The fact that Stanford's CDs were not FDIC-insured should have been a tip-off to consumers. One of the safest ways to protect your money is by making sure your money is in FDIC-insured CD accounts. If you need to deposit more than the FDIC limit of $250,000 (set to revert back to $100,000 at the end of the year) then a tool such as MoneyAisle's CD Laddering will let you split your deposits across several FDIC Member banks.

On to the news roundup:

The Miami Herald:

Miami broker: Stanford raised red flags early on

Miami broker Charles J. Hazlett was one of the top producers at Stanford Group's Miami office in 2002. He even won a 700 Series BMW for selling $10 million in certificates of deposit in a single quarter that year.

But when the broker began questioning his managers about how the affiliated bank's high-rate CDs were invested, his relations with the firm soured, he says. He resigned under pressure after one year.

Bloomberg.com:

FDIC Insurance, Market Rates Key to Protect CDs, Advisers Say

Any CD sold by a bank or broker that investors are considering should be insured by the FDIC, said Jeanie Wyatt, a certified financial analyst at San Antonio, Texas-based South Texas Money Management. When U.S. investors put their money with an offshore bank, their investments become out of reach of FDIC protection and SEC oversight, Wyatt said.

FOX Business:

Robert Allen Stanford Caught

And now the same questions are emerging as those that arose with Madoff: What were the fire-engine red flags investors missed in the Stanford fraud case? And why didn’t market regulators at the SEC catch Stanford, given that problems about his operations flew across their radar screen as early as 2001, says the Wall Street Journal?