Professor John Griffin

Research Profile​

• Podcast – Finding Fraud with John Griffin (October 2021, Salem Center at McCombs School of Business)

  • Professor John Griffin talks about forensic finance, his dedicated research pursuits to finding fraud, and what the process of uncovering these findings looks like. The podcast also highlights his various research papers, such as his most recent paper over potentially fraudulent loans in the COVID-19 government relief program.

• This Texas Finance Professor Sifts Data for Signs of Rigged Markets (October 2018, Bloomberg)

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Paycheck Protection Program and FinTech

• 15% of Paycheck Protection Program Loans Could Be Fraudulent, Study Shows (August 2021, New York Times)

• Fintechs Found to Be Much More Likely to OK Suspicious PPP Loans (August 2021, Bloomberg)

• Online financial companies’ processes facilitated fraud in PPP loans, Texas university study finds (August 2021, USA Today)

 

Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities (CMBS)

• Commercial Properties’ Ability to Repay Mortgages Was Overstated, Study Finds (August 2020, Wall Street Journal)

• Wall Street’s Cooked Books Fueled the Financial Crisis in 2008. It’s Happening Again. (April 2021, The Intercept)

• The Kushners’ Freddie Mac Loan Wasn’t Just Massive. It Came With Unusually Good Terms, Too. (October 2020, ProPublica)

 

Credit Ratings and Collateralized Loan Obligations (CLOs)

• CLOs May Be Riskier Than What Ratings Suggest, New Study Finds (October 2020, Bloomberg)

• The Looming Bank Collapse (June 2020, The Atlantic)

• Financial Engineering Made Risky Loans Seem Safe. Now They Face a Huge Test. (March 2020, Wall Street Journal)

 

Cryptocurrencies and Digital Assets

• Bitcoin’s Price Was Artificially Inflated, Fueling Skyrocketing Value, Researchers Say (June 2018, New York Times)

• Large Bitcoin Player Manipulated Price Sharply Higher, Study Says (November 2019, Wall Street Journal)

• Podcast – Bitcoin Comes Untethered (November 2019, Wall Street Journal)

• Bitcoin’s astronomical rise last year was buoyed by market manipulation, researchers say (June 2018, Washington Post)

• Has bitcoin come to the end of its Tether? (June 2018, Financial Times)

• A Lone Bitcoin Whale Likely Fueled 2017 Surge, Study Finds (November 2019, Bloomberg)

• The World’s Most-Used Cryptocurrency Isn’t Bitcoin (September 2019, Bloomberg)

• On Crypto Exchanges, the Trades Don’t Always Add Up (July 2019, Bloomberg)

• Tether Used to Manipulate Price of Bitcoin During 2017 Peak: New Study (June 2018, Bloomberg)

• Cryptocurrency tether used to boost bitcoin prices, study finds (June 2018, Reuters)

• A single anonymous market manipulator caused bitcoin to top $20,000 two years ago, study shows (November 2019, CNBC)

 

Market Manipulation

• Regulator Looks Into Alleged Manipulation of VIX, Wall Street’s ‘Fear Index’ (February 2018, Wall Street Journal)

• Does the VIX Need Fixing? Sure Looks That Way (May 2018, Bloomberg)

• VIX Trading, Hoaxes and Blockchain (May 2018, Bloomberg Opinion)

• VIX Misbehavior Leads Exchange to Fine Trader $1.28 Million (February 2018, Wall Street Journal)

• VIX: Wall Street ‘fear gauge’ – manipulated or maligned? (September 2018, Reuters)

• Is the VIX Being Gamed? A Sudden Swoon Has Traders Talking Again (January 2018, Bloomberg)

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Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities (RMBS)

• Fraud Revealed as Key to Financial Crash (December 2020, McCombs School of Business)

• Loose Credit Led to Housing Price Bust (July 2020, McCombs School of Business)

• Mortgage Bankers and Hedge-Fund Revivals (May 2017, Bloomberg)

• The Bankers Behind the Financial Crisis Actually Got Promoted (June 2017, Vice)

 

Op-Ed

• Coronavirus bailout for airlines and cruise lines is socialism for the undeserving rich (March 2020, USA Today)

 

Other Media Mentions

• $4.4 Billion EOS Token Raise Fueled by Wash Trading, Says New Research (September 2021, Decrypt)

• Crypto Exchanges Have a Plan to Beat Binance: Play by the Rules (July 2021, Bloomberg)

• Is Bitcoin Safe? (February 2021, Money)

• Behind the Bitcoin Bubble (January 2021, Wall Street Journal Opinion)

• The Tether Controversy: A Brief History (January 2021, Decrypt)

• How a Japanese Rice Farmer Got Tangled Up in the Hertz Bankruptcy (November 2020, Wall Street Journal)

• Bitcoin Gains Ground on Gold, Bolsters Claim as the Asset of Tomorrow (May 2020, Cointelegraph)

• Controversial Crypto Coin Tether Gains Popularity at Gambling Sites, Pot Shops (October 2019, Bloomberg)

• Bitcoin prices have been manipulated, study says (June 2018, CNN)

• What If Bitcoin, Crypto Prices Are Being Manipulated? (June 2018, Forbes)

• Bitcoin whales get bigger, threatening price swings (December 2019, Los Angeles Times)

• The Real Reason Behind Bitcoin’s Epic Rally Revealed? (November 2019, Forbes)

• Who are the bamboozlers manipulating the cost of bitcoin now? (November 2019, New York Post)

• Bitcoin’s Record Price Surge of 2017 Caused by a Single Person, Study Claims (November 2019, The Independent)

• Mysterious Bitcoin Player Manipulated Cryptocurrency to Historic $326 Billion Market Value, Study Claims (November 2019, Newsweek)

• Bitcoin’s bubble was the result of one big player: Study (November 2019, Fox Business)

• Crypto Coin With $21 Billion in Daily Volume Sparks Regulator Concerns (October 2019, Investopedia)

• CryptoKitties Ran Wild on Ethereum First. Now Tether Is Clogging the Digital Ledger (October 2019, Fortune)

• Cheating in Marriage May Mean Cheating at Work (October 2019, Psych Central)

• Tether, not Libra, may be the cryptocurrency behind bitcoin’s surge (June 2019, Quartz)

• Crypto Exchanges Suffering Major Outflows Even As Bitcoin Soars (June 2019, Investopedia)

• As bitcoin nosedives, regulators said to be investigating whether it was propped up illegally (November 2018, CNBC)

• Crypto Coin Tether Defies Logic on Kraken’s Market, Raising Red Flags (June 2018, Bloomberg)

• CEOs Who Cheat in Bedroom Will Cheat in Boardroom, Study Shows (October 2018, Bloomberg)

• Much of bitcoin’s 2017 boom was market manipulation, research says (June 2018, CNBC)

• Whistleblower alleges manipulation of Cboe volatility index (February 2018, Reuters)

• Bitcoin prices have been manipulated, study says (June 2018, CNN)

• What If Bitcoin, Crypto Prices Are Being Manipulated? (June 2018, Forbes)

• Bitcoin’s price has been manipulated with another cryptocurrency: tether, professor says (June 2018, Los Angeles Times)

• Bitcoin prices were manipulated: study (June 2018, The Hill)

• CRYPTO: From VIX to bitcoin—a story of market manipulation (June 2018, Yahoo Finance)

• Tether Manipulation Pushed Up Bitcoin’s Price, Researchers Find (June 2018, CoinDesk)

• Bitcoin Frauds Keep Growing (June 2018, Naked Capitalism)

• Bitcoin Price Manipulation Fueled Top Cryptocurrency’s 2017 Rally: Report (June 2018, The Inquisitr)

• Is Bitcoin Going to Zero? (June 2018, Yahoo Finance)

• ‘The mother of all crypto scams’: Bitcoin’s price manipulated during ‘meteoric rise’, researchers find (June 2018, News.com AU)

• Bitcoin’s astronomical rise last year could be buoyed by market manipulation, researchers say (June 2018, Spokesman Review)

• The hunt for bitcoin market manipulation is gaining momentum (June 2018, Quartz)

• Crypto Extend Losses Amid Reports That Bitcoin Prices Was Manipulated During 2017 (June 2018, Investing.com)

• Research Says Bitcoin’s Rise Caused By Market Manipulation (June 2018, BroBible)

• Bitcoin’s record-high 2017 price was result of market manipulation, claims study (June 2018, TechSpot)

• Bitcoin price analysis: BTC/USD recovers from Wednesday’s lows; the crypto bubble might have been engineered, research shows (June 2018, FX Street)

• New Research Shows Bitcoin’s Meteoric Rise Was a Scam (June 2018, San Antonio Express)

• Bitcoin Today: Prices Attempt to Rally Following Early Weakness (June 2018, The Street)

• Was bitcoin’s rise built on a lie? (June 2018, PitchBook)

• Bitcoin is slipping after a study found signs its 2017 bull run was driven by market manipulation (June 2018, Markets Insider)

• Bitcoin’s Atmospheric Rise Might Have Been Tied To Tether (June 2018, PYMENTS)

• Bitcoin is slipping after study claims its 2017 bull run was driven by market manipulation (June 2018, Business Insider)

• Report: The bitcoin boom may have been caused by price manipulation (June 2018, Fast Company)

• Bitcoin Prices Are Falling Again. Here’s What’s Behind the Latest Plunge (June 2018, Money)

• Bitcoin prices manipulated, says study (June 2018, Whistleblower Online)

• Is Bitcoin a SCAM? Cryptocurrency’s huge price spike last year was caused by massive ‘market manipulation’, claims study (June 2018, Daily Mail UK)

• Bitcoin’s 2017 Surge Was the Result of Manipulation, Experts Say (June 2018, Futurism)

• Bitcoin’s record price was artificially manipulated, research claims (June 2018, New York Post)

• Bitcoin’s price was artificially inflated last year, researchers say (June 2018, Toronto Star)

• Remember how Bitcoin’s value soared in 2017? Most of it was market manipulation: study (June 2018, Global News)

• New Research Shows Bitcoin’s Meteoric Rise Was a Scam (June 2018, The Entrepreneur) 

• Bitcoin’s price was artificially inflated last year, researchers say (June 2018, Boston Globe)

• Bitcoin’s rise might be linked to price manipulation, study indicates (June 2018, The Verge)

• Market manipulation was key factor in Bitcoin’s bull run, researchers say (June 2018, The Next Web)

• Academics Claim Tether Used to Pump the Price of Bitcoin on the Bitfinex Exchange (June 2018, Crowdfund Insider)

• US researchers claim bitcoin’s price was manipulated during 2017 spike (June 2018, Silicon Republic)

• New Research Claims Bitcoin Price was Manipulated using Tether (June 2018, News BTC)

• Crypto Collapse Accelerates As Bitcoin Miners Turn Cashflow Negative (June 2018, Zero Hedge)

• Bitcoin’s price was artificially inflated last year, researchers say (June 2018, San Francisco Gate)

• Bitcoin prices have been manipulated, study says (June 2018, Channel3000)

• How S&P 500 options may be used to manipulate VIX ‘fear gauge’ (June 2017, MarketWatch Opinion)

• Study: Top Bankers Suffered No Career Penalties Since Financial Crisis (June 2017, Vocativ)