Fascinated by all sorts of stories in the financial press about corruption and organized crime in top financial circles, which currently focus on insider trading, I open the thesaurus that comes along with my word-processing software, and I look up the word “thief.” And then I look up all the synonyms that come my way. Soon enough I have a staggering list in front of me: robber, burglar, shoplifter, plunderer, pickpocket, bandit, crook, embezzler, swindler, mugger, raider, highwayman, smuggler, racketeer, bootlegger, impostor, housebreaker, pilferer, con artist, criminal, brigand, bag snatcher, poacher, gangster, trickster, buccaneer, mobster, rustler, plagiarist, trickster, dissimulator, hacker, charlatan, bilker, shark. There are synonyms aplenty, to be sure, but antonyms are hard to come by. And so I give up. The bulging list suffices to prove my point. We are born thieves, that is. Our ways and means differ across time and space, but the verdict is nonetheless universal. So much for insider traders currently in the limelight. What else would you expect?