Sober Look

Equity investors might find it a bit surprising that the rating agencies are not necessarily all that excited about the recent wave o...

The bank downgrades last night were met with enthusiasm by the markets. Morgan Stanley stock jumped after hours when the downgrade was les...

Fitch has been on a downgrade "war path" recently. The latest downgrade vs upgrade statistics are showing a "mini spike...

Here is a recent chart from Fitch that shows ratings migrations for US banks between 2007 and 2011. The trend makes sense in terms of wha...

Intrade generally represents an efficient market with thousands of participants placing bets on various events - what is sometimes referre...

One major overhang on the markets continues to be the threat of sovereign downgrades in Europe by the S&P: S&P Press Release,...

The equity markets sold off after the close, with Morgan Stanley down 0.8% after hours and 3.5% correction intraday.  At least a portion o...

PRMIA, an organization for "risk management professionals" (whatever that means these days) generates some revenue by organizing c...

For a mere $4,095, you too can learn from the best in the business of rating structured finance securities - Moody's. Learn things like...

The rating agencies are not just under fire from regulators and lawsuits, but also threatened by new competitors from outside the traditi...

The rating agencies are now taking hits from every direction. The Big Three are becoming increasingly focused on trying to defend themselves...

Here is another example of a clueless government bureaucracy missing the point when it comes to what was at the heart of the financial cri...

We recently received a comment related to bank failures from someone pointing out that in Germany, with a population of some 82 million, the...

Here is a great BNN interview with Ed Grebeck discussing bank capitalization and the rating agencies. Of particular interest is the discuss...