Todd G. Everts: Absolutely. The average American would say if anyone is making more than $200,000 a year, why should they have anything to complain about? Because their kids are going to public school, the price of gas is in line with what they need, so why would anybody need that much money?

Host: (…) here’s one from Tanguy who writes in here…What products are available to lessen the risk of Madoff scandal to protect investors while in the hands of a fund manager? Are there products or are there safety checks?

Todd G. Everts: There’s more of safety checks. This new axiom, a new terminology which is referred to as a managed account is really the direction that most of the industry and the alternative industry is heading towards to make sure that there isn’t another Madoff. You can look into the account, you can see the actual securities that the manager is buying and selling on a daily basis.

Host: Also a separation of the actual investment function, the allocation and the actual holding, right?

Todd G. Everts: Yeah.

Host: The actual domicile, actual aggregation should be done outside and separately. Is that correct?

Todd G. Everts: All of the above. One of the ways is to ring-fence them so that there isn’t any toxicity that flows between them but also being able to see what transactions are occurring and making sure that you don’t have too much counterparty risk.

Host: Okay. Here’s one from Jim who writes in from California….With the FDIC involved in this new program will that cause insurance rates for banks to go up?

Todd G. Everts: I think it will cause insurance rates for banks to go up because of that same thing we talked before about not knowing what the toxicity of the assets are and not knowing if Geithner’s plan will work, the cost of FDI insurance will go up.

Host: One more…it’s a little bit of abbreviated or might be partially in the form of attachment…one writer asked very simply: will China continue to buy and store metal…what kind of metal would this be?

Todd G. Everts: All types of metal..but rather than just buying the metal or buying a contract on the metal they’re doing everything they can to buy the factories and the mines.

Host: So you think China’s on the verge of a buying spree and it will be unfettered, there won’t be too much political opposition…that’s been the problem for them, hasn’t it?