Fitch, Moodys, Standard and Poors. Remember these fine companies continued to stamp “SOLID GOLD”, “AAA”, “TOTALLY SAFE” on mortgage loan trusts that were packaged together by the subprime lenders even as the entire subprime industry was hurtling toward a spectacular crash like a jetliner at full throttle heading straight into the ground. (This is your captain speaking, you may notice the ground moving toward us very fast and you can feel the G forces as we near impact with terra firma, but rest assured, everything is perfectly in control…BOOM, CRASH, SCREAM!)
Like the rest of the players in the apocalyptic sub prime crash these paragons of deceit, fraud and complicity have not only escaped all liability, they have actually thrived in the years after the crash. Now why are these companies able to skate away from any liability…at least here in America, the home of the White Collar criminal oligarchy?
Well they’re feeling the heat elsewhere:
As stock and bond markets across the world tumbled on fears about Italy and Spain, it emerged that police acting on orders from prosecutors had raided the Milan offices of rating agencies Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s as part of continuing investigations into their role in the recent financial turmoil.
Italian shares plunged on Thursday, with some leading firms losing more than 10% of their value. But the closing level of the benchmark FTSE MIB index was not released for reasons that remained unclear more than an hour after the close.
