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Downgrading The US Will Cost S&P $1.5 Billion

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Remember when S&P forgot for a second that it lives in a world of pretend free speech, and where telling the truth would promptly result in a lawsuit by none other than the US government under false pretenses (and from which Buffett darling Moody's was excluded) after it downgraded the US from AAA to AA+ in the summer of 2011? A downgrade which as Bloomberg previously reported led to this exchange with then Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner: "S&P’s conduct would be looked at very carefully," Geithner told McGraw according to the filing. "Such behavior would not occur, he said, without a response from the government."

Well, S&P will never make the same mistake again, because according to Reuters, it will cost it $1.5 billion to settle with the government and put the whole "downgrade" episode in the past.

  • S&P SAID IN SETTLEMNT TALKS WITH WITH DOJ,STATES: RTRS
  • S&P SAID IN SETTLEMNT TALKS FOR $1.5B: REUTERS
  • SEC SAID TO BAN S&P FROM RATING PART OF CMBS MARKET FOR A YEAR
  • S&P SETTLEMENT WITH SEC SAID TO INCLUDE $60 MILLION FINE
  • S&P SETTLEMENT ON CMBS SAID TO BE ANNOUNCED AS SOON AS TOMORROW

And let that be a lesson to anyone else who thinks the First Amendment is anything but window dressing.

 

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Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:37 | 5685265 Shizzmoney
Shizzmoney's picture

"When in doubt, send an invoice" 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:38 | 5685278 nuubee
nuubee's picture

"When they pay, rehypothecate the windfall."

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:42 | 5685294 Gaius Frakkin' ...
Gaius Frakkin' Baltar's picture

Now everybody make sure to be good little serfs and pay your taxes to Uncle Satan this year.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:44 | 5685305 Romney Wordsworth
Romney Wordsworth's picture

bad news is good news... OH WAIT! [until it ain't].

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:55 | 5685358 Manthong
Manthong's picture

Russia’s response to a bad rating was to just shitcan the rating agencies.

But SnP will pay the tribute to keep the gig.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:01 | 5685374 knukles
knukles's picture

Fuck

I think I've gone blind

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:07 | 5685391 Ignatius
Ignatius's picture

Power shapes reality.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:47 | 5685541 Heavy
Heavy's picture

Money - the only speech that gets heard. 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:57 | 5685578 Fish Gone Bad
Fish Gone Bad's picture

To show the world the US means business, upgrade the US to AAA++  that way everyone will really know the double plus state of affairs...

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:03 | 5685612 JohnnyBriefcase
JohnnyBriefcase's picture

Where does a credit rating agency get that kind of cash?!

Oh right...

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:20 | 5685653 Richard Chesler
Richard Chesler's picture

We punished some folks.

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:40 | 5685744 asteroids
asteroids's picture

Fucking weasel. Were is the squirrel gun?

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 20:20 | 5686089 old naughty
old naughty's picture

This is no punishment...

all downgrading was supposed to get thrown out with the marc2market water...

from now on only upgrading.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 23:08 | 5686761 Soul Glow
Soul Glow's picture

What's the First Amendment?

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 21:09 | 5686280 A Nanny Moose
A Nanny Moose's picture

doubleplusgood

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:12 | 5685638 RaceToTheBottom
RaceToTheBottom's picture

Debits?  Credits?  

Profits?  Losses?

Fuckem.....

It is all fictional

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 20:29 | 5686113 old naughty
old naughty's picture

ever since the first day when they wrap tiny strings around sticks in Egypt, we the hu-man race has been refining...and un-refining the art (or is it science?) of accounting.

All terminology was there, designed to be upgraded, no?

Try look at all the "wholly cow" (or is it sacred?) scheme, SOX, marc2market, grading...

Do you really think balance sheets are there to support forward guides (or is it backwardation), no? 

I'd be a-shame if i were an accounting (or auditing) professional. Look at it this way, they have managed to cure the ulcers --- no need for worrying accountants.

Wed, 01/21/2015 - 01:28 | 5687128 RaceToTheBottom
RaceToTheBottom's picture

There is no world where CDO are anything but ways to move debt onto others and profits into WS.

When was the last time you heard of an Accounting arrest.

Banks don't even need to account for the correct value of worthless houses on their books....

Accounting was one of the things that attracted money to the US business environment.  WS has shot that to hell.

 

Wed, 01/21/2015 - 01:27 | 5687129 RaceToTheBottom
RaceToTheBottom's picture

dupe

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:04 | 5685392 SilverIsKing
SilverIsKing's picture

When the US Dollar collapses, S&P will get all of its money back plus interest.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:06 | 5685397 nuubee
nuubee's picture

By then it will be standard to be poor.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:31 | 5685497 nink
nink's picture

They should upgrade US to AAAAAAAA+++++++++++++  (valid rating on ebay) and charge US $1.5B for the upgrade

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:36 | 5685516 ShrNfr
ShrNfr's picture

Sounds like Centsles who is a seller over grossly overgraded coins there.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:42 | 5685533 overmedicatedun...
overmedicatedundersexed's picture

seems like keeping them in-line is simple, we say AAA you better print AAA..free markets and all that.

S&P did try to bring some honesty into the business - but honesty for our .gov is a crime.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:46 | 5685315 pods
pods's picture

Ahhh, Je Suis S&P.

An absolute circus this has become.  Lando shaking down the S&P because they decided to actually do their jobs.

Who the fuck would rate a nation with $150 trillion in liabilities and an annual deficit of $1 trillion?
You couldn't buy an Aaron's TV with that kind of credit.

pods 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:49 | 5685332 nuubee
nuubee's picture

Actually you could, they probably have layaway options too.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:55 | 5685340 Romney Wordsworth
Romney Wordsworth's picture

I was gonna say...:-)

 

NOTWITHSTANDING ~ lol [It's a comedy FREAKSHOW bitchez!].

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:49 | 5685334 knukles
knukles's picture

Exactly what I was thinking.  Shakedown, extortion....
Tony Soprano is jealous at the magnitude of their criminal reach.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:04 | 5685386 Rainman
Rainman's picture

The Bushes are tied to the hip of the McGraws for generations. Ol Barbie Bush sits on the McGraw-Hill advisory board.

 Not that it matters

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:42 | 5685301 SickDollar
SickDollar's picture

No big deal that can be printed in 2 hrs

get to  work Yellen

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:53 | 5685344 pods
pods's picture

Ummm, no, the S&P has to come up with this coin, not the US.

pods

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:42 | 5685292 Gaius Frakkin' ...
Gaius Frakkin' Baltar's picture

.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:46 | 5685320 NoPension
NoPension's picture

1.5 billion. Chickenshit to them.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:54 | 5685354 pods
pods's picture

You are reading it backwards.  

This is the S&P that has to fork this over.  Not the FED/Treasury.

pods

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:15 | 5685443 assistedliving
assistedliving's picture

S&P rated Mozilo triple A; but not USSA?  wtf?

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:37 | 5685270 vinoverde
vinoverde's picture

Gangster government

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:39 | 5685279 kaiserhoff
kaiserhoff's picture

Treason trials are too good for them, but you're right.

Let's add some RICO indictments.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 20:50 | 5686195 dogbert777
dogbert777's picture

Screw RICO. We're Government serf.  GAAP not spoken here

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:40 | 5685286 t0mmyBerg
t0mmyBerg's picture

Those fucking sobs as DOJ should be tarred and feathered and then fed to wild dogs.  It was amazing the other day watching BBerg iinterview with some corporate CEO or CFO or something who was suing the government over something and their main concern was whether the guy didnt fear reprisals and as such wasnt it aganst his fiduciary duty!!!!???!!?!?!?!  WTF  It is time for revolution though I am not holding my breath

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:47 | 5685547 Dugald
Dugald's picture

tarred and feathered and then fed to wild dogs. "

You miserable sod, what have wild dogs ever done to you......Yous must be one of them Redneck fellers I hears about...

Wed, 01/21/2015 - 01:23 | 5685642 RaceToTheBottom
RaceToTheBottom's picture

That is what killed Old Yellen....

She has been mentally dead for some time.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 19:37 | 5685937 BullyBearish
BullyBearish's picture

Watch and learn about how criminal they really are:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1Qt6a-vaNM

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:37 | 5685272 autofixer
autofixer's picture

This is what is known as a "soft tyranny."  Enjoy comrades!

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:40 | 5685277 saints51
saints51's picture

Mother Fucking Murica. Home of the fleeced.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:42 | 5685298 Shizzmoney
Shizzmoney's picture

Land of the NeoLiberals

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:41 | 5685280 JustObserving
JustObserving's picture

In case anyone has forgotten, S&P President, Deven Sharma, had to depart quickly after the downgrade:

Standard & Poor’s President Deven Sharma will give up his post on Sept. 12 to “pursue other opportunities,” parent McGraw-Hill Cos. said in a statement Monday night. Sharma, 55, will stay on with the firm through the end of the year as Citibank chief operating officer Douglas Peterson becomes the firm’s president.

Sharma’s departure comes barely more than two weeks after S&P announced its decision to downgrade the U.S. credit rating to AA+ amid what it described as uncertainty about Washington’s political climate and whether the United States would be able to make big steps toward deficit reduction.

The agency offered its downgrade even after the Treasury Department argued that S&P’s number crunchers had overestimated future U.S. national debt by $2 trillion and the firm corrected its math in a final release.

“It looks like he’s being helped out the door,” Noel Hebert, a credit strategist at Mitsubishi UFJ Securities USA Inc. in New York, told Bloomberg. “If it was a planned retirement, it should have been handled in a different way.”

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0811/61890.html

Truth is treason in a fascist, police state.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:01 | 5685378 Max Steel
Max Steel's picture

Truth hurts .

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:41 | 5685281 ebworthen
ebworthen's picture

If you don't serve the banksters, you will be punished.

A nation "of the banks, by the banks, for the banks".

.Gov is simply the lackey enforcer for the banks.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:40 | 5685287 kaiserhoff
kaiserhoff's picture

The high price of truthiness.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:43 | 5685300 SethDealer
SethDealer's picture

hell S&P is about as dependable as a hong kong rolex

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:11 | 5685355 kaiserhoff
kaiserhoff's picture

A fake rolex is a great investment.  Where else can you buy a chick magnet for $25.00?

They always pretend not to notice, but the eyeballs as big as saucers, are a dead giveaway.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:44 | 5685302 dumbStruck
dumbStruck's picture

We slapped down some folks.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:46 | 5685311 nuubee
nuubee's picture

Worse, they slapped down some folks who were daring to speak truth to power.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:07 | 5685400 i_call_you_my_base
i_call_you_my_base's picture

Eh, you're talking about an institution whose entire business model wrests on conflicts of interest. They are paid to lie. I guess it's possible that they tried to tell the truth this one time. Hard to say.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:56 | 5685573 Dugald
Dugald's picture

 

"wrests"  you did you wrote wrests.....with gold on the rise I find I am laughing at the silliest things......traa llllaaaa calloo callay...

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:44 | 5685304 Yikes
Yikes's picture

That's seriously messed up.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:45 | 5685309 wmbz
wmbz's picture

There is all the proof anyone needs...Ratings agencies are a complete farce, completely worthless as any kind of guide!

The entire system is nothing more than a fraud, plain and simple.

FUBAR!

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:45 | 5685313 Kaiser Sousa
Kaiser Sousa's picture

S&WHO???

 

fuck them bitches.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:48 | 5685323 Max Steel
Max Steel's picture

" But But we  downgraded russia just above junk level isn't that enough uncle sam ?? "

As I said , these agencies are non-neutral and corrupt . Now when it comes to downgrade US suddenly land of freedom will not be happy . 

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:04 | 5685610 Dugald
Dugald's picture

 

Uncle Sam being that kinda guy leaps to the fore and  slaps S&P with another 1.5m for insulting his Russian friends..KAPOW! BLAM! and KAPLOOIE!

(note to self) its just gold fever Dugie so cut it out...must have a Bex, a cuppa tea and a good lie down

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:47 | 5685324 Yen Cross
Yen Cross's picture

 A retail arm of F/X trading gets erased over $225m. Zero asks for $5Billion for illegals?

 I must be living on an entirely different tangent?

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:47 | 5685325 taketheredpill
taketheredpill's picture

 

 

"No Prior Restraint"

Ha!

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:49 | 5685331 Yen Cross
Yen Cross's picture

 Let the games begin! Bitchez

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:51 | 5685336 LawsofPhysics
LawsofPhysics's picture

Remind me, how many Tim Geitner's "arsonist" are bankrupt and in prison?

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:34 | 5685501 jiggerjuice
jiggerjuice's picture

Doz teef tho... Blarf. 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:52 | 5685339 dumbStruck
dumbStruck's picture

Who needs a credit rating when you can just print however much you want anyways ?

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:53 | 5685348 SmedleyButlersGhost
SmedleyButlersGhost's picture

With no accountability for where the "fine" goes -that should about cover Barry's next 2 golf trips for he and his cronies. Not enough to cover her highness though. Maybe they will use it to help the guys at the VA Hospitals ..... nah

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:56 | 5685356 SMC
SMC's picture

It would have been great to see S&P stand it's ground and prove that the “emperor has no clothes”. Thankfully, it does not take a financial genius to realize that American government and Federal Reserve paper is only backed by thugs with guns.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:31 | 5685702 silverer
silverer's picture

But that's why they won't let anyone audit the Fed.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:57 | 5685363 Renov8
Renov8's picture

They are a ratings agency, aren't they?  Doing there job. 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:59 | 5685372 honestann
honestann's picture

And who says the USSA isn't the correct term?  Anyone?

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 16:59 | 5685376 i_call_you_my_base
i_call_you_my_base's picture

I almost feel sorry for S&P. Almost.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:02 | 5685380 Elliptico
Elliptico's picture

Ratings are free speech.  Ratings are not free speech.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:03 | 5685388 Mike Honcho
Mike Honcho's picture

S&P repsonded with USA = AAAA+

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:10 | 5685406 Peter Pan
Peter Pan's picture

Sooner or later governments will start fining/harrasing/targeting voters for making the wrong voting choice as well. If you think that is far fetched, just remember that with electronic voting they have the ability to know which way you voted.

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:30 | 5685698 silverer
silverer's picture

Umm... we are already punished for making the wrong voting choices...

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:10 | 5685409 NoWayJose
NoWayJose's picture

A $1.5 billion settlement sure beats nail guns and tall buildings....

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:29 | 5685491 calltoaccount
calltoaccount's picture

How much was S&P or any other ratings agency fined for enabling Banksters to steal hundreds of billions via totally phony ratings of MBS.  These guys (and the other ratings agencies who did the same thing) are crooks and should be doing hard time, let alone getting off with a fine. 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:11 | 5685413 dumbStruck
dumbStruck's picture

One day they'll give the people such a bitch slap, that they'll wake 'em up.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:10 | 5685416 tommylicious
tommylicious's picture

all ratings agencies should be shuttered.  DO YOUR OWN FUCKING CREDIT WORK!!!

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:24 | 5685470 nuubee
nuubee's picture

I'd love to, but...

1) I have a job in a non-finance related field, so I don't have the good tools to speed things up...

2) Companies are fairly loathe to send me their financials when I have no relationship with them...

Ratings agencies exist because an information vacuum exists. Getting rid of the rating agencies doesn't do anything to solve the information vacuum problem, it only makes it worse and lets the biggest thugs in the room interject themselves more directly than they already are.

What's needed is something like a wikileaks for corporate financials...

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:18 | 5685453 numapepi
numapepi's picture

Clearly the out of control government has no fear of us or our reaction at all.

To fine a rating agency for doing their job is so overtly corrupt it shows how the political elite despise us.

Obama's Amerika.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:25 | 5685468 Yen Cross
Yen Cross's picture

 Ratings agencies are moot. If Iran becomes a nuclear power, how does that increase it's  industrial/intellectual production?

  Iran has suddenly procured Aliens to use nano engineering, ffor their warheads.

  Iran has the capacity already to produce a nuclear warhead. Iran doesn't have the capacity to produce a multistage hydrogen bomb.

    Iran want's to make the warheads very small. That my friends, is why we have vested interest.

  Personally, I like electricity! Bitchez

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:25 | 5685473 f16hoser
f16hoser's picture

Raise your hand if your country is Trillions of Dollars in the red like the US... (crickets, crickets)

US Economy is JUNK. Get over it...

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:30 | 5685488 kchrisc
kchrisc's picture

Even Orwell could not foresee this circus.

The banksters need to repay us.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:49 | 5685542 Downtoolong
Downtoolong's picture

Thanks for calling the new Fiat Ratings Company, how can we help you today?

 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:47 | 5685544 Armed Resistance
Armed Resistance's picture

How come when I see that picture of Geithner I want to go "American History X" on those ugly chompers?  Put your mouth on the curb, Tim!

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:49 | 5685556 Pumpkin
Pumpkin's picture

Hey, theives don't live in dens for nothing.  I wonder what would happen if they just unlisted them.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 17:59 | 5685594 messystateofaffairs
messystateofaffairs's picture

The whole paradigm is simply pathetic and ridiculous. 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:27 | 5685692 silverer
silverer's picture

S&P should no longer report the credit rating of the U.S. government.  That way they can't be right or wrong.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:35 | 5685693 Wish Doctor
Wish Doctor's picture

http://townhall.com/columnists/neilmccabe/2015/01/17/obama-to-lay-the-wood-sp-with-1b-fine-after-us-debt-downgrade-n1944335/page/full#!

Obama to Lay the Wood S&P with $1B Fine After US Debt Downgrade

Neil McCabe | Jan 17, 2015

The Justice Department is about to put the squeeze on the Standard & Poor's credit rating service for the tune of $1billion, roughly its 2014 profit, and a fine meant to send a message, according to a Jan. 12 report in The New York Times.

 The message: Do not tangle with the Obama administration.

 The charge: Standards & Poor's analysts misrepresented their sincere opinion of securities, and instead downplayed the amount of risk associated with the securities, specifically Residential Mortgage-Back Securities and Collateral Debt Obligations, in order to ingratiate themselves to the companies issuing the securities.

 This charge, which Attorney Eric H. Holder Jr., made Feb. 5, 2013, was completely over-the-top, but we are talking about a $1 billion fine and sticking someone with blame for the 2008 financial crisis.

 “Today’s action is an important step forward in our ongoing efforts to investigate – and – punish the conduct that is believed to have contributed to the worst economic crisis in recent history,” Holder said.

 Driving the civil action against Standard & Poor's is Stuart F. Delery, the acting assistant attorney general. Delery is the attorney behind the crusade forcing the Boy Scouts of America to welcome homosexuals as both scouts and scout leaders. It made Delery a celebrity lawyer in left-wing legal circles.

 The basic DOJ narrative is that because a company hires S&P to rate its products, S&P has an incentive to tilt its analysis in favor of the company and its products. Investors, fooled by S&P's sunny-day analysis, lost money with the securities went south.

Frankly, this narrative is foolish. There is no incentive for a rating agency to be wrong about the risk associated with securities—regardless of whatever emails some idiots sent to each other stating otherwise.

First, what good is the rating from a rating company that it is always wrong?

Second, if the system, where companies pay to have their products rated was prone to abuse, would not everyone get the coveted Triple-A?

The real story, of course, is not about knuckleheads throwing money into a campfire on the say-so of devious S&P analysts, triggering the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

The real story is that Standard & Poor's, two days after President Barack Obama signed the Budget Control Act of 2011, downgraded debt issued from the U.S. Treasury from AAA to AA+.

In court filings, people at S&P claimed that then-Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner communicated to them that they would be punished. Until Holder lined up his charges, the rating firm was just waiting for the other show to drop.

The Budget Control Act of 2011 was born of one in a series of standoffs between Capitol Hill Republicans and the president. The act immediately raised the debt ceiling by $400 billion and gave the president authority to raise the debt ceiling another $1.2 trillion.

The BCA was expected to reduced increases in the federal debt by $4 trillion over 10 years, but instead the number was closer to $2.4 trillion.

S&P said it was not impressed.

“We lowered our long-term rating on the U.S. because we believe that the prolonged controversy over raising the statutory debt ceiling and the related fiscal policy debate indicate that further near-term progress containing the growth in public spending, especially on entitlements, or on reaching an agreement on raising revenues is less likely than we previously assumed and will remain a contentious and fitful process,” S&P said in its statement.

This was not a small deal. It was a big deal. In the financial services industry, Treasury debt was and is recognized as the most secure securities available.

Besides being theoretically risk-free, as a practical matter, many organizations, foundations, trusts and other vehicles are required to invest in AAA-rated instruments. The easiest was to meet this requirement is to invest in treasuries, which suddenly had to be dumped to meet fiduciary standards.

For the record: The day Obama signed the Budget Control Act of 2011, federal debt stood at $14.5 trillion, 93 percent of Gross Domestic Product, which is the annual measure of the size of the American economy. On Jan. 15 at $18 trillion, 101 percent of GDP.

Clearly, Obama is more interested in controlling dissent, n

Neil W. McCabe is a journalist working in Washington. He was a senior reporter for the Human Events newspaper and for many years a reporter for The Pilot, Boston's Catholic paper. In 2009, he

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 18:52 | 5685774 69BIGDOG69
69BIGDOG69's picture

Re: "Downgrading The US Will Cost S&P $1.5 Billion"

This headline is misleading and should read, "Having Downgraded The US Will Cost S&P $1.5 Billion."  ZH should be able to distinguish between historical and prospective events.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 19:10 | 5685825 ReactionToClose...
ReactionToClosedMinds's picture

hey Warren Buffett...can you help spring Jon Corzine...maybe Charlie Munger can figure something out....you guys are brilliant and 'oracles' and all that.  Its not fair you know

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 19:30 | 5685849 Burls
Burls's picture

Let's hear it for S&P:
The penalty for egregiously misjudging the value of $Billions of MBS - ZERO
The penalty for dissing the US of A - $1.5 Billion

Timaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! ...

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 19:41 | 5685949 jabhagsb
jabhagsb's picture

This is why China and Russia are creating their own ratings agency. 

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 20:36 | 5686136 Moon Pie
Moon Pie's picture

So, why file the complaint in the Central Dist. of California and not New York?  Where is the lawsuit against Moody's or Fitch or....the sell side cretins?  Angelo anyone?  Lehman?  Bear?   They're the ones who made all the misrepresentations.  Here's the complaint:

http://www.justice.gov/iso/opa/resources/849201325104924250796.PDF 

Unbearable to read, but Page 76-77 is one area of interest....they make it out like it was S&P who blew up the housing market.  While S&P went along as mules, it was was all the REMICS that ignored their own underwriting, didn't fund the trusts or ever properly acquire the assets (mortgages, and rehypothicated/multi pledged them) and represented that they did.  That's what blew up housing.  Classic pump and dump.   

Can't make this shit up....and don't fuck with "AAA" America, S&P.  Ha.  What a fucking joke.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 20:45 | 5686164 Moon Pie
Moon Pie's picture

Meanwhile, Jon Q. Public in bum-fuck Indiana who bought his family home for $200k in 2006 with 20% down, is still underwater 75 large or threw in the towel and Blackrock owns it and is now renting it out.  What about that, SEC, USDOJ, Timmy?

Fuckers.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 20:45 | 5686168 fuu
fuu's picture

You cannot make this shit up.

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 21:18 | 5686316 red1chief
red1chief's picture

The first amendment is window dressing? Next thing I know you will try to tell me that we are not "spreading freedom".

Tue, 01/20/2015 - 21:28 | 5686353 nathan1234
nathan1234's picture

Rob one Paul to pay another Paul ( Goldsucks/Morgue etc).

Balancing the Books

(All Peters, of course, can continue drowning)

 

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