Sept. 16, 2026

From Wall Street to Your Street: What One Voice Can Change

Show Notes
Transcript

Marc Hoffman spent years investigating the forces behind the 2008 financial crisis — tracing oil price manipulation straight to Wall Street's biggest players. But this episode isn't about reliving 2008. It's about what Marc learned along the way: that ordinary people, armed with persistence and a willingness to speak up, can hold powerful institutions accountable. Join us for a conversation about civic responsibility, community action, and why showing up matters more than ever.

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The topics and opinions expressed in the following show are

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solely those of the host and their guests and not

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those of W4CY Radio, its employees, or affiliates. We make

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its employees or affiliates. Any questions or comments should be

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directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing W4CY Radio.

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Welcome to the Ask Good Questions podcast, broadcasting live every Wednesday,

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6 p.m. Eastern Time on W4CY Radio at W4CY. com. This

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week and every week, we will reach for a higher

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purpose in money and life, as well as a focus

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on health and wellness. Now, let's join your host, Benita

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Bell Anderson, as together we start with asking good questions.

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Hello and welcome to the Ask Good Questions podcast. I

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am your host, Benita Bell Anderson, and today we have

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got a topic that I think you're all going to

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really be interested in. This is going to have to

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do with what's going on in the world. It's not

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really about financial education. It's more about what's happened in

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the past and what one person has done about it.

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So with that, I will introduce my guest today. His

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name is Mark Hoffman. Mark, will you join the podcast

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stage now?

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It's nice to be here with you.

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Thank you, Mark. Now remind me, where are you coming

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from in the world?

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At the moment, I'm in Florida. Okay. Where my residence

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is now. I used to live in New York on

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Long Island.

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I can kind of tell the New York, a little

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bit of New York-y accent going on there.

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Well, it took me a while to reacquire it after

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living away for seven years between school and the Army. Okay. Okay.

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Well, let me tell you a little bit about this guy.

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He spent years investigating the forces behind the 2008 financial crisis. Now, Mark,

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you don't know about my history with 2008, but it

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was devastating for me. I was doing some pre-construction real estate.

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It was awful.

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And it was a big, huge, massive learning experience for me.

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But in Mark's case, he was tracing oil price manipulation

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straight to Wall Street's biggest players. We're not reliving 2008 today,

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but it's about what Mark has learned along the way,

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that ordinary people armed with persistence and a willingness to

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speak up can hold powerful institutions accountable. So we're going

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to be talking about you know, his lived experience, his

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sharp reasoning, his wit, his moral seriousness about this whole thing.

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So I know I can think, I'm just thinking in

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my mind of all the people that I know had

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that that period of time was a huge, huge learning

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experience for a lot of people. And it was not easy.

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So he's also written a book about this. But before

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we get into your book, Tell us a little bit

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about your background. How in the world does a guy

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like you come to be talking about things like this?

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Well, it's not just one thing that did it. It's

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a bunch of things that all contributed to me being

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who I am. One is my parents always instilled in

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me just to do the right thing because it's the

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right thing to do. Right. college, I had some decisions

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to make when I was about 19 or so. And

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an instructor I was friendly with said, you're young, you

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got a lot of years of shaving in front of you.

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It makes life a lot easier if you can look

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yourself in the mirror when you shave. And then during

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my time in college in the late 60s, the draft

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was very heavy and Vietnam was over everybody's head. I

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was going to draft parties every other week. So I

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joined ROTC. went into the army as a lieutenant. The

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leadership training and the leadership experience, I have to say,

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looking back, had to be a major contributor to things

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I've accomplished and where I've gone since then. Okay. I

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came home, my first job was as a construction superintendent

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on a very large construction site. was 46 high-rise apartment buildings.

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I started out as an assistant superintendent trainee over three

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of them, then an assistant super over five of them,

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and a superintendent over 17, and then I was deputy

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project superintendent over the whole job. I got into commercial

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real estate a few years later. I was running a

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50-man office for a major real estate office in New York.

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Spent 27 years on Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, a

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volunteer job. I was doing some entertainment business as a

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little sideline and spent 16 years on the board of

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directors of the National Conference of Personal Managers. And it

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just seems like I've joined a high officer or board

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of directors on a number of different groups. I was

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in Fishing Club, Alumni Association, and everything else. And or

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that it's who I am. And that was always somewhat analytical.

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I always like to see what made things work. And

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so- I think that's key. That's key. And you start

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looking back and say, why is it that way? And

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this doesn't make sense, but this does. So you keep

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looking at things.

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Well, you said that the recession actually started around Hurricane Katrina.

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In 2005. I mean, I remember it was like the

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mortgage collapse, but you're saying it was before that.

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It was the oil prices that caused the recession, and

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the recession caused the mortgage collapse. Okay. And I can

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give you a little understanding of two separate things that collided.

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The mortgage business, the traditional home mortgage failure rate, is

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one-tenth of 1%. That's one in 1,000. When you take

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out mortgage insurance, which is usually required, it's generally a

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quarter of a point. That covers the one-tenth plus the

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fees and profits to everybody along the line. Your bank

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sells off the mortgage. They were getting three times the

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profit on the sale of an adjustable than they were

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on a fixed price mortgage. And the reason for that

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is the end buyer would rather have something that went

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up over a period of time. And the deal was

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so good and so safe, certain entities like Bear Stearns

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would buy them up and put them into big bundles.

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And the deal was so safe that the end buyers

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or hedge funds, investment banks and other investment groups got

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40 to one leverage. What that means is they would

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put down a billion dollars and buy $ 40 billion worth.

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And they'd finance the other 39 with margin financing, like

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buying a stock on margin, except they're much more highly leveraged.

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And they were paying the cheapest rate because they were

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the biggest users. They were paying 2.5%. The bundles were

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paying 6.5%, maybe 7% in that range. So they saw

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a four-point spread. Well, four points on $ 40 billion is $ 1. 6

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billion every year. For the billion dollars they put down once.

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Well, I don't want to get too lost in the

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weeds because some people might be going, that's too much

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for me. But the point I want to get to

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is you realize that you couldn't just watch this happen.

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I mean, most people are not going to act, but

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you acted differently. So walk us through briefly what that

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meant for you.

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It meant a lot of knocking my head against the wall.

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I was concerned my head was getting a little flat

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on one side. But it was Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs,

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and BP formed the Intercontinental Exchange in 2000. In 2001,

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they bought a small London-based petroleum exchange, moved it to Atlanta,

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where The Intercontinental Exchange, ICE, to its friends, was headquartered.

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And they applied to the, I have to call it

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the Cheney administration, for foreign exchange status. As a foreign exchange,

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it's kind of like being a foreign embassy. Very few

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laws applied to you. So they were stealing nickels. A

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nickel a gallon, no one's going to notice. Gasoline by

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me at the time was $ 1. 75. Whether it was $ 1. 80

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or $ 1. 70 wouldn't have changed anybody's life significantly. And this

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was great. Then along comes Katrina in 2005. Okay. Late

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August 2005. And now 19% to of our production offline,

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they said for 90 days. But I couldn't imagine that

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all of the facilities had the identical damage that would

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take 90 days. That was a question mark in my mind.

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Shouldn't some of it take a week or two to

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fix and some a month, some two months, some three

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months to be back online? But gasoline by me went

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up from $ 1. 75 to $ 3. 50 overnight and stayed that price

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for three months, then started to come down, got down

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about 252 and a quarter, then all of a sudden

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took off again. That second taking off was Morgan and

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Goldman saying, hey, we can play for much bigger dollars.

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And they were manipulating the oil prices up and down,

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and they would make long bets and short bets. Long

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bet is that the price will go up, short bet

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is betting that the price is.

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Gonna go down, Well, you were, I mean, you were

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reaching out to senators, the CFTC, which is what? What's

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the CFTC?

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Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Okay.

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The FBI, the Attorney General. And so, what was that like?

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Well, I started... I guess it was around 2007. I

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called Carl Lang's office. He was a Senator from Michigan, uh,

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because he was heading a committee that was investigating why

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oil prices were going up, what was going on. And

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all the banks were in front of the Senate saying

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it's India and China. And I'm saying that doesn't make

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any sense. You know, uh, All these banks have people

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following India and China on a moment-by-moment basis, if not

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living there. And they didn't go poof overnight and nobody noticed.

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That just didn't make any sense to me. When I

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found out it was Morgan and Goldman manipulating everything, I said,

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got to do something about it. And I tried calling

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Senator Lange's office. But the problem was, I don't live

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in Michigan. So I would call there and the receptionist

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was very nice. She would take my phone number. I

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didn't hear back. And a few weeks later, I would

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call again and take my phone number and take notes.

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And the third time around, I'm saying, are you only

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playing with me because I don't live in Michigan? And

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she would giggle and say, yeah. So that was kind

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of frustrating. I said, I've got information that can help them,

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his committee, which has tremendous national and global effects on everybody.

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I can help.

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And she's probably going, who are you?

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But you don't live in Michigan, so you can't talk

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to us.

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Well, what kept you going when officials weren't responding the

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way that you had hoped that they would?

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I kept trying to find somebody else to do it. Yeah.

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You were just persistent.

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I went to the FBI. and said, well, I went

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to Commodity Futures Trading Commission in February of 2010, filled

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out their forms. You can only do things online. Nobody

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wants to talk to anybody. Right. You got to do

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it online. And I think when the World Trade Center

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came down, someone may have called it in and said,

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this is going to happen, but they didn't fill it

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out online. They didn't have the right form. But anyway,

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I want the commodity futures. He called back my contact

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in April and said, I know you can't discuss an

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ongoing investigation, but did you find anything worth looking into?

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He said, we're getting a number of calls on it now.

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It's definitely being looked into. Was I first? They said,

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who am I? I'm just a little schnook in town.

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I'm just a small businessman. I'm not a Wall Street guru.

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And a couple of weeks later, early May, I hear

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on the radio, there's a rumor on Wall Street that

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DOJ is looking into Morgan Stanley, probably for commodity futures,

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probably for delivery. Yeah, I'm saying, good. And I called

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my contact and he thought it was great and everything

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was wonderful. I checked back with him in August. Congress

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was working on some new laws to control the speculators.

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Because the big banks said, it must be the speculators

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that are manipulating the oil prices. It's their fault. Somebody

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else did it. And I said, do the new laws

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that Congress is working so diligently on, are they affecting

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trading on a foreign exchange? He said, they're in the

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conference room right now discussing that right down the hall.

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I said, great. I said, because Morgan and Goldman are

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trading on a foreign exchange. He said, don't worry about them.

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We got them. We got them. It's coming. We got them.

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It's coming. And I'm feeling great. You know, no one's

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buying me dinner, but when I shave in the morning,

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it's real easy to look in the mirror. A little extra,

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you know, kick in my step when I'm walking down

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the street. Every now and then there's a grin on

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my face for some unexplained reason. A couple of months

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go by, I don't hear anything. My friends on Wall

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Street aren't hearing anything. So I call this guy back.

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Maybe it was November, early December. And I said, so

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when is it coming? I don't know what to tell you.

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It's up to the bosses. Nothing more I can do.

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I check it out. The commissioner is a former Goldman

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Sachs partner. And I said, he's not going to indict

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his friends. You know, and then I started... One of

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the fishing councils in New York, I used to sit,

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I sat for five years on their advisory commission. One

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of the guys was a trader at Morgan Stanley. And

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I asked him, I used the name Ted in the book.

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I said, I understand that this gentleman quashed the investigation.

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He said, yeah, absolutely, he quashed it. And I said,

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he quashed the investigation? He said, yep, absolutely. And a

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friend of mine standing next to me who knew my

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involvement was just standing there with his jaw on the floor.

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We just looked at each other. There was nothing to say.

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And I came back at this guy and said, you're

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responsible for the world collapsing. You're funding terrorism. You're causing

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revolutions in the Mideast. 15 million American families are losing

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their homes. everybody here, all the fishermen here are struggling

254
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to stay alive because of your work, and you're here

255
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trying to save a fish? I said, where are your priorities?

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And they went running away from me, trying not to

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look in my direction anymore. But in 2012, I went

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to New York State AG's office and filled out their forms,

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a couple of fully written two-page form. And they called

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me back. We worked it out. It took a couple

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of months for that to happen. But they got back

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to me, and we spoke. I told them I had

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never seen a trade go on, but I can tell

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you what's going on. And this guy just confirmed everything

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to me, and they said, well, Ted, cooperate with us.

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I said, well, it depends how you approach him. And

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they said, well, how would you recommend approaching him? I said,

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you go up to him, you tell him he's got

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two options. Option one is to cooperate. He can receive immunity,

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spend the next several years fishing, golfing, having dinner with

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the family. Or option two is he can be subject

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of the investigation. And if any wrongdoing is found, there

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may be some jail time involved, plus the loss of

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any proceeds improperly attained. Any assets they bought, like a house,

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a boat, or a car?

276
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You're making me think of the godfather.

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00:18:56.630 --> 00:18:59.890
Well, you know, they said to me, what is it

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you do for a living? You know, I want to

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say I watch a lot of Law and Order. Right.

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Well, I mean, so, I mean, you're just a regular Joe.

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And one of the outcomes of this episode is I

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just want people to realize that if you're concerned about something,

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you need to speak up.

284
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Right? Absolutely.

285
00:19:23.829 --> 00:19:27.809
And so let's pivot just a bit. At what point

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did you decide, I need to write a book? Because

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00:19:31.589 --> 00:19:34.869
if you go to his website, you'll see a little

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trailer there, and you'll see something that talks about rant.

289
00:19:39.319 --> 00:19:42.279
So when was it that you said, I've got to

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write a book about this?

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00:19:44.299 --> 00:19:47.559
Well, I was always nervous about writing a book. I've

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got my friend Rocco, who's does nothing but write.

293
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Sounds like he works for the.

294
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Godfather, too. Not quite. But we are very close. We

295
00:19:59.180 --> 00:20:02.519
both worked in a blue-collar side job for a while.

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And he and I were both educated. And we were

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both Vietnam vets. So we bonded very closely and we're

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still very dear friends many years later. But anyway, I

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00:20:17.039 --> 00:20:19.759
always tease him that he couldn't write, he couldn't order

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a hamburger at McDonald's in a thousand words or less.

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00:20:23.119 --> 00:20:25.420
But my big concern was if I was going to

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00:20:25.460 --> 00:20:27.920
write something, it would be, this is what happened. He

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00:20:27.980 --> 00:20:29.960
did at the end, it'd be five or six pages.

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You know, in the previous 40 years, I hadn't written

305
00:20:32.900 --> 00:20:38.049
anything more than a two page business letter. But in 2013,

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I went to Department of Justice, and I called and said, well,

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who do I talk to to report a possibly corrupt

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federal commissioner? And they said, oh, let me put you

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right through to the criminal division. Young lady answers the

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phone there very sweetly and says, oh, you have to

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speak to the fraud department. Fraud department says you have

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to speak to the FBI. The FBI says you have

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to speak to justice. I said, justice just transferred me here.

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You've got to speak to the inspector general and The

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00:21:07.289 --> 00:21:10.450
Inspector General's Department says, you have to speak to the

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criminal division. I said, wait a minute. I'm on the

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phone five minutes. I've been around the world three times.

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Yeah.

319
00:21:16.390 --> 00:21:18.789
Well, I started out there. They passed me around like

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00:21:18.829 --> 00:21:20.900
a hot potato. He said, I'd like to help you,

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but we don't do that. They do that. I go back.

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00:21:24.220 --> 00:21:26.839
The same young lady's voice says, well, I don't know

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who you spoke to before, but it wasn't me. And anyway,

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00:21:30.640 --> 00:21:32.940
she says, just send me an email. I said, well,

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and maybe somebody will look at it. I said, okay.

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What do you mean maybe? This is responsible for Europe

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going bankrupt, revolutions in the Mideast, it's funding terrorism, 15

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00:21:43.960 --> 00:21:47.099
million American families are losing their homes. Okay, do you

329
00:21:47.140 --> 00:21:49.799
have something more important to do? Am I interrupting a

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pinochle game? I mean, what's going on? And he said,

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00:21:53.579 --> 00:21:55.920
just send in the email. Well, I sent in an email.

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That was in May. I called back after Labor Day.

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No one got in touch with me. And the gentleman says, oh,

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00:22:07.259 --> 00:22:10.059
we didn't call you back because you didn't offer any proof.

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00:22:10.140 --> 00:22:12.619
I said, nobody asked me for proof. I said, here's

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00:22:12.640 --> 00:22:15.900
the guy's name and phone number at Commodity Futures. Here's

337
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the guy's name and phone number who's a trader at Morgan.

338
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He said, we don't do that. You have to get

339
00:22:22.609 --> 00:22:25.910
the signed statements. I said, they're not giving me signed statements.

340
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I don't have a badge. You got the whole FBI.

341
00:22:30.779 --> 00:22:32.240
We don't do that. If I did that for you,

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00:22:32.319 --> 00:22:34.349
I'd have to do it for everybody. Well, yeah, that's

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a great idea. I said, this is responsible for this, that, that, that,

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and the other thing. And you can't make a phone call?

345
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Then down the street from you. We don't do that.

346
00:22:44.990 --> 00:22:47.940
I mean, so what you're talking about is you are

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talking about public accountability.

348
00:22:50.259 --> 00:22:55.319
Right. Really. And I said, we got into the volume

349
00:22:55.339 --> 00:22:57.039
went up a little bit. And finally, I slammed the

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00:22:57.079 --> 00:23:03.690
phone down and started typing. And I said, you know,

351
00:23:03.710 --> 00:23:05.730
a number of people had mentioned, oh, it sounds like

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a book. It sounds like a book. You should write

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a book. So that was always in my mind. But

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I was always afraid to write because I get too precise.

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This is what happened. He did it at the end.

356
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And it came out.

357
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So real accountability. So, I mean, you know, you're I

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00:23:24.759 --> 00:23:27.769
can just see you saying, you know, I'm just one person, but.

359
00:23:29.130 --> 00:23:33.309
I can think, I mean, you know, the Erin Brockovich

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00:23:34.089 --> 00:23:38.130
story and about the town and, you know, that all

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00:23:38.150 --> 00:23:40.960
of that, you know, that was made into a movie

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and she was just one person. But it ended up

363
00:23:45.960 --> 00:23:50.180
being made into a movie about that situation. And so

364
00:23:52.359 --> 00:23:55.240
what does real accountability look like when you're talking about

365
00:23:55.319 --> 00:23:58.329
powerful institutions like what you're trying to go after?

366
00:23:58.930 --> 00:24:03.690
Well, Wall Street finances, the people on Wall Street finance

367
00:24:03.730 --> 00:24:07.119
a lot of movies. None of them will touch my book.

368
00:24:09.680 --> 00:24:12.259
None of them. I've cost them billions and billions of dollars.

369
00:24:12.900 --> 00:24:15.920
Goldman Sachs was making a profit of a billion to

370
00:24:15.940 --> 00:24:20.430
a month. I don't think they're going to finance my movie.

371
00:24:22.710 --> 00:24:28.259
Though I do have strong movie interest from a producer

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with a big track record. He loves my book, and

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00:24:32.609 --> 00:24:35.349
we agree on the format of the book, how the

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00:24:35.369 --> 00:24:40.049
movie would go. But he's got several projects in front

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00:24:40.089 --> 00:24:47.299
of him and no financing. We can do a good

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00:24:47.339 --> 00:24:51.779
movie for probably $ 12, $ 13 million. Right.

377
00:24:52.079 --> 00:24:54.339
Well, stay tuned for that, right?

378
00:24:54.359 --> 00:24:56.220
Yep. In the meantime.

379
00:24:57.009 --> 00:25:01.490
You've talked about being able to look yourself in the mirror.

380
00:25:01.589 --> 00:25:03.730
I mean, you said that earlier about being able to

381
00:25:03.759 --> 00:25:07.339
look yourself in the mirror. Where did that principle come

382
00:25:07.380 --> 00:25:10.579
from for you? I mean, just always wanting to be

383
00:25:10.640 --> 00:25:12.299
honest about your business dealings?

384
00:25:13.480 --> 00:25:19.190
I was always straight in business. And, you know, no

385
00:25:20.130 --> 00:25:22.769
one's putting me up for sainthood. I'm not Mr. Perfect.

386
00:25:23.230 --> 00:25:25.150
And there's been more than one occasion where I've looked

387
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in the mirror and and said, hey, dummy, you handled

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00:25:27.529 --> 00:25:30.589
that situation wrong. You should have done it differently. And

389
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I try to do it differently next time. But it's

390
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a system that's worked for me. I speak at a

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00:25:37.450 --> 00:25:42.170
high school on occasion. I tell them basically the same thing,

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where you look in life, and a legitimate person will

393
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survive in the end. Go ahead.

394
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Why do you think so many people stay silent when

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they see something wrong?

396
00:25:59.450 --> 00:26:01.630

From Wall Street to Your Street: What One Voice Can Change

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