On April 19th I participated via zoom with the MBA class “Resisting Corporate Corruption” taught by my friend Stephen Arbogast at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
The course focuses on case studies documented in Professor Arbogast’s textbook “Resisting Corporate Corruption: Cases in Practical Ethics from Enron through the Financial Crisis” (Wiley, 2017), including the case written about my experience at Citigroup “Write to Rubin? – Pressure on Underwriting Standards at Citigroup.”
The class reviewed many slides on my case prepared by Prof Arbogast, with my providing additional information on the content of the slides (two of the zoom slides are shown).
The class was very engaged and there was a robust Q&A session at the end of the class, when we also talked about my providing evidence of the massive Citigroup fraud to the SEC three months before the bank bailouts and my giving nationally-televised testimony to the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission. We also discussed the SEC, FCIC and DOJ subsequently trying to hide much of my damning testimony from the public.
As Professor Arbogast and I told the class, it is so important that students understand that corporate corruption can take many different forms so that later, in their careers, when the students find themselves around a corrupt corporate culture, they can readily identify it and be able to formulate appropriate actions they can take.
Richard Bowen is widely known as the Citigroup whistleblower. As Business Chief Underwriter for Citigroup during the housing bubble financial crisis meltdown, he repeatedly warned Citi executive management and the board about fraudulent behavior within the organization. The company certified poor mortgages as quality mortgages and sold them to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and other investors.
