Meanwhile, other financial actors, most typically very large and wealthy institutional investors, bought derivatives of the loans, so-called mortgage-backed securities (MBS). MBS are more complex financial products that are produced by assembling the loans (see Borgogno Colangelo 2020). As homeowners default on their mortgages, MBSs crumble in value - costing investors and financial institutions trillions of dollars. Following the ensuing crash, millions lost their homes, many of them their jobs, and their countries an economic depression. Take the case of Bernie Madoff. The much-hyped Ponzi scheme by the popular US banker Bernie Madoff was the biggest of its kind. He swindled investors of approximately $65 billion, assuring them of very high dividends and taking money from new customers to return what the other investors had reaped from their investments. After his 2008 plan broke down, hundreds of staffers, pension funds, companies, and families lost everything. A good number of those who made substantial deposits have had to grapple with psychological and financial problems after losing everything they had saved for their entire lives. Such stuff-ups reveal the importance of good morality and hard rules in ensuring that devil-may-care financiers do not abuse money-for-nothing. It's why there is so much hue and cry about bankers, and so much public demand for transparency in the financial industry. That is why commercial honesty matters