Re: got away...
<quote>They got away with the crime for 15 years,</quote>
I feel the real crime was in not promptly reporting the issue to the SEC, and for that reason alone, they should have faced a higher fine. It would be nice to extract the fine from whoever sat on that decision's paycheck/pension/golden parachute.
Please allow these assumptions (and I do know the ALTERNATE spelling of "assume"):
1) The original coder never expected branch codes to have an alphabetic character in them. (In hindsight, one should not have been allowed to create an alphanumeric branch code.)
2) WHOEVER decided to implement alphanumeric (10A, 10B, etc) branch codes did not run that decision past the IT staff responsible for maintaining the code. They had no clue to what someone in Ops was doing.
3) No one ever bothered to test the code once the alphanumeric codes were put into use because of 1) and 2) above. This is the reason why the time span was measured in years.
4) Most likely (and I am assuming here) when the discrepancy was discovered, the shit hit the fan. The logic mistake was fixed pronto.
What should have happened was CGMI immediately informing the SEC, and CGMI immediately provide corrected reports.
BUT some corporate asshole sat on the decision, and hoped it would go away. Well, it didn't. CGMI may have come out better if the "optics" of the incident were better. The "optics" being:
1) they fucked up royally,
2) they quickly fixed the fuckup,
3) they provided only a partial correction of the misleading reports,
4) they sat on reporting to the SEC for months which imparts the stench of "coverup"
IM(NS)HO, who ever at CGMI 'sat' on the decision NOT to promptly inform the SEC should be sent on a new career path without any "parachute" (severance pay).