[dragonwriter]

> Those fines aren't coming from the top executives (or even mid-level) who made the decisions to promote this behavior, but rather the investors.

The investors are responsible for hiring and delegating authority to the top managers of the firm -- and through them the rest of the employees -- they may choose to be hands off, but that doesn't eliminate their responsibility.

The are also responsible for establishing procedures for holding those managers, etc., accountable for harms they cause to customers and/or the firm itself, so if the firm is (and, thereby, the investors are) getting hurt with no recourse, that's largely the investors own fault.

[chrisbennet]

Sure the investors pay for the fraud but...maybe the fraudsters make more money for investors than legitimate businesses even with the (proportionally tiny) fines?