That doesn’t make him solely responsible (not without other factors, which may well exist for all I know) but it does make him principally responsible, and in an honest court, that ought to be enough to be actionable. So, say a jury finds (just to pull a number out of the air) that he is to blame for 65% of the damage that was done to the Spanish economy — that number would be the basis of the damages to sue him for.Not that he has it, in all likelihood, or anything like it. He has whatever is left, whatever hasn’t been squandered on luxuries that depreciated the second he picked them up, from his personal compensation. But I agree that he shouldn’t even be allowed to keep that much, if he’s convicted, and high-profile defendants are and ought to be a routine part of keeping other CEOs, who might be tempted to commit the same crimes, at least somewhat afraid of getting caught.

Just how heavy is that water you’re carrying for the elite?

And to reply to an Antinous comment below (the Reply button disappears when replies get too narrow), “And those fiduciaries all lied” needs a citation. Sure, real estate salespeople are still salespeople with all that that implies, but that’s a very sweeping claim.

Paraphrasing the same article you linked:
“The reform hasn’t benefited anyone,” said Amelia Calvo, 59, who lost her job in a bank two years ago. “If there’s no investment (by the government but only austerity measures), it’s impossible to create jobs.”

Of course the little people still have their bills to pay, homes to lose and get punished by austerity. What happened to the bankers again? Oh right: Bonuses.

And the greedy idiots borrowing money to buy real estate thinking it was like printing money, they bear no responsibility?

Real estate agents are fiduciaries. Mortgage brokers are fiduciaries. Appraisers are fiduciaries. They’re all legally obligated to deal in good faith, and they all lied. The reason that these professions are considered fiduciaries is that the average person cannot navigate a real estate contract or a loan contract or conduct an appraisal. So the law creates a class of fiduciaries to help average people through the process. And those fiduciaries all lied.

Seriously, no one’s saying he bears none, just that there is a certain hypocrisy in painting the conned as “innocent bystanders” when they had been as greedy and irresponsible as the con-man.

It’s a game that requires both sides to be greedy bastards.
Of course, when the game’s up, one side has more to lose than the other, that doesn’t make the stung party any less guilty of greed and suspension of reason.

Moreover, the conned ones were very happy as long as this brought employment and prosperity.
But now that it doesn’t work anymore, it’s such a bad thing, and of course always was, sure, it was an ecological disaster, still they borrowed money to be part of it…
Hypocrites I tell you.

A bubble like this one exists not only because banks and governments create the conditions for it to exist, but also because thousands upon thousands of suckers believe in making a lot of money with minimal work and investment.
It’s the “little people’s” greed that created the spanish bubble.

Sure, a con requires a con man, but it also requires a greedy mark believing he’s the one gaming the system, and boy, was the spanish people a greedy sucker.

From the banks and government point of view, that con paid off, as it provided prosperity and employment as long as no one asked too many questions about the reality of the valuation and debt.

The real estate bubble was caused mainly by the creation of the eurozone (interest rates too high at the core, too low at the periphery), technical innovations in banking (securitising mortgage debt made it easier for banks to lend a lot more), and good, old-fashioned greed by all the people who thought they were making an easy buck. No, no the “banksters”, but all the people who borrowed and bought houses thinking they were making huge amounts of money.

Take some responsibility, people.