Madoff's Biggest Victim

Which person owns the unfortunate distinction of being Bernie Madoff’s biggest victim? Try Walter M. Noel, manager of the Fairfield Greenwich Group. Noel lost $7.5 billion, more than half of his firm's holdings. In Greenwich, according to The New York Times, the Noels were famous for sending out Christmas cards with their five beautiful daughters—the family even posed for a spread in Vanity Fair in 2002. The Fairfield Greenwich Group charged clients a fee of one percent of assets annually and 20 percent of annual investment gains, and regularly returned 10 to 12 percent. Noel's largest fund invested exclusively in Madoff. One daughter said through a spokesman that "a very substantial part of each family member's personal assets was invested with Bernard Madoff alongside those of our investors."