Typically the markets can afford to compensate people on a day-to-day basis for small crime, but the entire reason bizarre concepts like clearing houses exist is that, from time to time, once every 10-30 years, an entire market can be destroyed overnight because of liquidity or counter-party risk or a combination, or some other situation like fraud. These things happen, and will continue to happen, which is why we should always look to the past when designing markets, and not fall for the folks telling about the wonders of their utopian future.