Regulators face Madoff grilling

The top US financial regulatory body has ordered an in-house investigation into why it did not detect the $50bn (£33bn) Madoff fraud case sooner.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) head, Christopher Cox, launched an inquiry into what he called a serious agency breakdown.



It has been revealed the SEC received specific warnings about Wall St figure Bernard Madoff almost ten years ago.

Mr Madoff has been charged with fraud in one of the biggest-ever such cases.

Investors, banks and charities across the world fear they may have lost billions of dollars since Mr Madoff's arrest.

It is thought that Bernard Madoff was running what was essentially the world's largest pyramid scheme, the BBC's Andy Gallacher reports.

Now serious questions are being asked about the SEC's role in not preventing it in the first place, our Washington correspondent says.