Monday, January 5, 2009

Op-Ed Contributors - The End of the Financial World as We Know It - NYTimes.com

Op-Ed Contributors - The End of the Financial World as We Know It - NYTimes.com: "The American International Group, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, General Electric and the municipal bond guarantors Ambac Financial and MBIA all had triple-A ratings. (G.E. still does!) Large investment banks like Lehman and Merrill Lynch all had solid investment grade ratings. It’s almost as if the higher the rating of a financial institution, the more likely it was to contribute to financial catastrophe. But of course all these big financial companies fueled the creation of the credit products that in turn fueled the revenues of Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s."