It may be only a small toy but it's making appearances on live television and the front pages of newspapers around the world.
It's an action figure of US broker Bernard Madoff, who has been accused of perpetrating possibly the largest investor fraud ever committed by an individual.
Madoff was arrested in December for allegedly running a huge Ponzi scheme, which cheated millions of investors out of $US50 billion.
In an unusual twist, the Madoff toy comes with a golden hammer, so the buyer can gleefully smash the figurine into pieces.
The toy's creator, Melbourne man Graeme Warring, moved to the US three years ago and fell into the toy-making business "by default".
He said he decided to create the now famous 'Smash-Me Bernie' doll after an Australian mate who lived in San Francisco lost money in the Madoff scandal.
"He lost quite a bit of money and he was pretty grumpy about the whole thing," Mr Warring told ABC News Online.
"So I made him this little action figure of Bernie Madoff. Bernie had a devil's body and a pitchfork, and I put a hammer in the box and I said, 'Listen, when you get this thing, just smash it to pieces - it'll make you feel better, and then go bury it in the backyard and put it behind you'.
"So he did it, thought it was terrifically funny, and then he started telling some of his mates about it and before you know it, everyone's started to order these things.
"People were ringing me up, saying, 'Can I get some of these, I want two, I want three, I want four', so I started making more and believe it or not, I had absolutely no intention of really showing it as a toy at the toy fair."
Dominating the press
Mr Warring is referring to the New York Toy Fair, which is the largest in the western hemisphere and attended by all the major international toy companies.
"There's thousands of exhibitors and it's spread over several levels of this enormous convention area that makes anything that we've got in Australia look like a garden shed," Mr Warring said.
"What's bizarre about the whole thing is you've got these massive companies like Mattel and Hasbro and all these other ones that are big, publicly listed companies that go to this toy show and they've got booths the size of Afghanistan.
"And here's this idiot from Australia sitting there in the corner with this little Smash-Me Bernie thing, and it's dominating the press - it's just unbelievable."
Mr Warring says the toy has generated media interest from all over the world, from the local New York news to the BBC and news services in Israel.
"The first thing that happened was that Reuters turned up and started shooting and the next thing I know I'm whisked off in a limousine to Fox Studios," he said.
"I was on the Shephard Smith show, where we smashed a Bernie on Fox News, and then I went on the panel of The Strategy Room and then we did CNN and NBC, and this morning it was on The Today Show.
"Honestly, it's just been insane. I've never seen anything like it before.
"And all of this publicity has more to do with Americans' contempt of Madoff than it does with my good idea; people look for an outlet to vent and little Smash-Me Bernies become the outlet."
'An accidental triumph'
Mr Warring says the toy's success is an example of Australian humour striking a chord in the United States.
"We've got such a quirky sense of humour when you compare it to the typical American sense of humour," he said.
"Some stuff we do just is funny - we think it's just normal but these people think it's a bit out there - and this is a classic example of that."
Mr Warring says the toy has "generated a life of its own" and he's now producing a whole line of Smash-Me dolls, customised for whoever orders them.
But he admits the Bernie Madoff doll was an unexpected success.
"Sales have been going very strongly - but if I'd sold two of them, I would have sold one more than I thought I would have sold, because it's a pretty tasteless sort of item," he said.
"These poor buggers have lost their money [in the Madoff scandal]; you don't want to be seen to be profiting from people's bad experiences.
"I literally didn't expect to sell more than one and even then, I didn't expect to sell it, because I gave it to a mate of mine and the next thing you know, everyone's started to want them.
"The whole thing's just an accidental triumph."
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