Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street: Jan. 9

Mumbai's Madoff (or Bombay's Bernie)

Bernie Madoff has a friend in Mumbai.

Ramalinga Raju, the founder and chairman of Indian outsourcing firm Satyam Computer Services(SAY Quote), stepped down Wednesday after disclosing that he had been falsely inflating profits for years at India's fourth-largest software services company. Raju said in a statement that about $1 billion, or 94%, of the cash on the company's books was fictitious.

Raju's shocking disclosure sent Satyam's Bombay-listed shares, Indian equity markets and the Indian rupee tumbling, with Bombay's benchmark index falling 7.3%. Satyam's New York-listed American depositary receipts plunged more than 90% from $9.35 a share to less than 90 cents. ...