Second point is the ethics through which Philbro team placed bets and earned money. This unit trades heavily on the oil and gas taking advantage of fluctuating prices of crude oil and refined oil (gasolene, etc). The production cost of per barrel of oil is less than 20 dollars, however, end users pay around 70 dollars, and, a big chunk of that inflated price is due to heavy trading activity in the commodities market. Oil and Gas is being used like shares, the profits generated are coming out of the pockets of you and me – the ordinary guys that drive cars and must fill their tanks, or, average Joe’s that need their house heated in the winter. This average Joe has no choice, he did not enter into the commodities market, he is not trading, but, he pays !! it is different scenario in the stock market, where Joe makes a concious choice of doing investment – if he pays or loses on his stock, then it is fair because it was his gamble. But for essential commodities, average person is not even in the market but plays outstandingly high price due to trading.

Think about this — if someone trades on the Honda cars or Toyota cars and due to which their cars are 50% higher in cost — will you ever buy them ? Absolutely not. You can afford to skip them because these are not essential commodities. And that is why no one is trading on such items. But they trade heavily on essential commodities – Now you know why.

It is not just Citigroup, but all big financial firms, private firms (read – everyone that has abandunce of money) flexes their financial mussle in such markets where average Joe is paying, and, they have their “talent” dream team like Mr Hall. Citigroup has no shame in taking billions of bailout from average Joe, give that to their dream team, and, share the gravy with Mr Hall where he can own a castle and fine art. Citigroup has nothing to lose – the initial investment came from average Joe, the profits are made at the cost of hardship to this Joe, so, what’s harm sharing the 10% gravy with Mr Hall ?