William Black

Bill Black is an Associate Professor of Economics and Law at the Universityof Missouri– Kansas City. He is a white-collar criminologist. His regulatory career is profiled in Chapter 2 of Professor Riccucci’s book Unsung Heroes (Georgetown U. Press: 1995), Chapter 4 (“The Consummate Professional: Creating Leadership”) of Professor Bowman, et al’s book The Professional Edge (M.E. Sharpe 2004), and Joseph M. Tonon’s article: “The Costs of Speaking Truth to Power: How Professionalism Facilitates Credible Communication” Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 2008 18(2):275-295. George Akerlof called his book, The Best Way to Rob a Bank is to Own One (University of Texas Press 2005), “a classic.”

Black developed the concept of “control fraud” – frauds in which the leader uses the entity as a “weapon.” Control frauds cause greater financial losses than all other forms of property crime combined and kill and maim thousands. He helped the World Bank develop anti-corruption initiatives, served as an expert for OFHEO in its enforcement action against Fannie Mae’s CEO, and assisted Icelandic and French leaders responding to their financial crises. Black has testified to Congress four times about the financial crisis – financial derivatives, executive and professional compensation, Lehman’s failure and related regulatory failures, and the role of control fraud in the bubble and crisis. He is a regulatory columnist for Benzinga