Though I'm sure Wall Street doesn't want to hear it, the only way forward is regulation, regulation, regulation.

People who have long been suspicious of the shady back room deals carried out in the financial industry have had all the prejudices spectacularly confirmed. Only by injecting an unprecedented level of transparency and accountability into the market are we going to convince the Average Joe that his money is going to be safe. Confidence starts from the ground up, so the bankers are just going to have to accept more interference if they are serious about getting the industry back on its feet.

For decades the cogs of Madoff's elaborate Ponzi scheme have simply been turning much like the cogs of any of Wall Street's biggest [greediest] banks. In other words, in his own way, Madoff is the same as these banks: an investment advisor too respectable to scrutinize.

The only way forward is as Joachim already noted, more regulation and more transparency. It will be a long time before any consumer will allow their bank any degree of autonomy.

"It will be a long time before any consumer will allow their bank any degree of autonomy."

I don't know about that - if there's one thing I've learned, it's that people have very short memories. I'm old enough to remember the previous financial crisis of the early 90's, and it amazes me that we have got ourselves into the same state again. Greed seems to overcome everything, in the end.

The only comfort is that these things go in cycles; we just have to ride this one out and wait for better times to return.

The banks need to go back to being boring with traditional, regulated lending. It's the only way to get us out of this financial quagmire and on the road to recovery.

What a great remark from Warren Buffett.
I suspect Madoff isn't the only banker who has been swimming without his trunks on. And while few bankers will have committed such calculated and far reaching fraud as Madoff, all have been complicit in the situation we find ourselves in today through their reckless actions and over-speculation.

Warren Buffet also spoke, "There are innovators, imitators and idiots". What technologies are the most innovative and valuable for the Fortune 500 right now?

It doesn't surprise me Nirpal - these things come in cycles and this was one huge bubble that had to eventually burst.