Who's Madoff with your money? Nichola Ross Martin looks at icebergs...

What a week it has been, what a year it has been. Bubbles are continuing to burst all over the financial services sector and the latest shocker is the saga of Bernard Madoff.

The former chairman of the US stock exchange, the Nasdaq, has been charged over a $50 billion hedge fund scam. The fraud was a "Ponzi" scheme, in which new investors’ money is used to pay the returns of older investors. It takes its name from the infamous Carlos Ponzi, who made millions from investors using the technique in the 1920s.

Few questioned the consistently high returns claimed on Madoff's funds and the scam was so spectacularly successful because no one suspected him. He was a star on Wall Street, and highly secretive, his wealthy investors thought they were all part of an elite club and, because of this, he managed to keep the scheme going for a long time, in fact many years.

Madoff has according to reports, over $17 billion invested in his funds at the present, included in this total is a couple of million invested by one of his sons. It was his sons who shopped him to the FBI.

The losers are not just wealthy individuals, other suckers are the banks; HSBC has announced that it may have lost $1.5 billion dollars and Banco Santander $3 billion. Over the coming weeks we are sure to learn of other financial institutions and funds worldwide who have also invested heavily in Madoff's investment funds.

The tip of a bigger iceberg, or perhaps this one is the iceberg itself? It seems that there could be a lot more icebergs, of all sizes still floating around.