Amazon.com might never have happened without Bernard L. Madoff.

Jeff Bezos once worked at D.E. Shaw, the quantitative hedge fund. But he quit in the early 1990s to open the online bookstore that would make him famous.

According to an article in Washingtonian magazine, Bezos ran his Amazon idea past Ted Leonsis, then AOL's president, who would go on to act as a sounding board for the e-commerce entrepreneur. Eventually Bezos confided to Leonsis that he left D.E. Shaw because "I had a competitor who was kicking my ass." That competitor was Bernie Madoff.

"So," Bezos told Leonsis, "no Bernie Madoff, no Amazon."

How would Bezos and Madoff even have crossed paths?