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European Banks Preparing To Boycott Big Three Rating Agencies
We were wondering how long Europe's insolvent, and very much scorned, banks would take the constant downgrade abuse (or reacquaintance with reality as we like to call it, but that is irrelevant) by the rating agencies without retorting. After all the same organizations that allowed bank "credit analysts" to pretend they did work for years, when they all merely fell in place in some lemming-like procession, patting each other on the back, pocketing record bonus after record bonus and praising groupthink encapsulated by the made up letters AAA, are now largely non-grata first in Europe, and soon, following the imminent downgrade of American banks, in the US as well. It appears that the response is finally coming. Sky News reports that "some of Europe's largest banks are intensifying discussions about a move to reduce their co-operation with the big three credit ratings agencies amid widespread dissatisfaction with their decision-making." After all, when all they do is downgrade, as opposed to the old standby, upgrade, who needs them. In fact, why not just shut their mouths entirely. Sadly, this is precisely what is on the horizon.
From Sky News:
I have learned that finance directors and other executives from about a dozen of the Continent's biggest lenders held talks on the issue during the Institute of International Finance in Copenhagen last week.
I'm told that the discussions did not result in a formal decision to reduce the amount of information disclosed to Fitch, Moody's and Standard & Poor's, but one source familiar with the talks said today that "things are certainly moving in that direction".
The judgements of the dominant trio of ratings agencies have been questioned repeatedly as the Eurozone crisis has deepened, triggering downgrades of numerous European governments and major banks.
Moody's is expected to announce downgrades to the ratings of British banks including Barclays, Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of Scotland in the next few days.
One senior bank executive put it like this to me: "The ratings agencies got it horribly wrong on the way up; there are lots of reasons to suppose they are getting it wrong on the way down."
They sure do: somehow they still rates banks in Europe higher than a D, when even blind chimps with typewriters would have no problem finding the correct key on the keyboard to describe the true solvency state of the continent's banking system.
In the meantime, the boycott of anyone who dares to write adversely of banks is coming. Because you see thair "assumptions" are wrong.
In an ideal world only banks, and specifically the same analysts who previously had relied solely on the rating agencies to do their work for them, should rate other banks. And the range of recommendations should range from Buy to Very Strong Buy only.
Anything below that should be forbidden by the respective constitution, of the US, and of the soon to be Federal German States of Europe next.
All of the above notwithstanding, the only real rating agency out there with some integrity was, is and will continue to be Egan-Jones. All else are merely fluffers for the largest paying client.
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But they rated all that MBS as triple A, what's the problem?
It's Wednesday?
So far that seems to be the only explanation.
Only a terrorist would do something as heinous as downgrade.
And you know what we do to terrorists...
That's OK, Zero Hedge and the internet blogs will rate the zombie banks with greatest accuracy anyway just like a free market should operate.
Reggie better watch his back!
Reggie is meaningless. Sean Egan better watch his back. And we'll be watching it too. Egan-Jones is the only rating agency with any credibility. And that's why the SEC is after them...
"Fluffers" FTW
Only a terrorist would do something as heinous as downgrade.
And you know what we do to terrorists...
We.........fund them through back channels?
Freud would say that the leaders of Europe are attempting to overcome their feelings of powerlessness. Killing the messenger is a last, futile attempt at asserting their absolute power.
Off with their head!
headline: eurpoean populace preparing to boycott banks.....
"Money power denounces, as public enemies, all who question it's methods or throw light upon its crimes." - Jennings Bryan
No honor among thives. The banks co-fraudsters rating agencies waited until even the dullest obsever could see anything above junk was just another fraud.
'All else are merely fluffers for the largest paying client.'
Zandi is Most Valuable Fluffer for 2012.
Cramer for the decade!
Since Lebanese girls became the new half-asians will BB+ become the new AAA?
The truth hurts eh?
It sure does, especially when AAA rated poop in a box blows up in your face.
My blind chimp Bobo with hairy palms that Michael Jackson gave me just typed 'XXX'.
TMI!!!
Well done Bobo!
Give Bob a big bonus this year so he can buy a place in the Hamtpons. He can hang out with the other wall street crooks and fling his shit around with the best of them.
They don't want a rating when it no longer suits them. Can we go below zero credibility?
why wouldnt they ?
Ratings agencies represent the print zone. Not the Eurozone. US downgrade not withstanding
They'll just solve it with more socialism, duh.
"The Ministry of Financial Truth," coming soon to a dictatorship near you.
Could the big three ratings agencies countinue their downgrades for free as punishment for the boycott?
Without adequate info, they'd be exposing themselves to all those slander/libel/butthurt suits the kangaroo courtesans are so fond of.
Amazing. Can you imagine their reaction if the agencies had actually done their jobs?
whats the timeline for american banks copying them?
The American banksters own them.
Honestly, I don't think nationalist labels apply to them, as they're "bigger" than that.
there is no time line, it's just an infinite elliptical loop that breaks periodically for loop-hole adjunct adjustment, making the revolve-lution obtuse to the human psyche --- the tried and true Serta lexicon for counting sheep while you sleep... ?
FED subliminal pillow talk for insomniacs.
I'd be more upset as a ratings agency if a boycott was announced by customers who actually had money.
And Egan-Jones is "super-independent"? Come on, don't be so naive.
No one's perfect.. but I'll take an Egan-Jones rating anyday over the big ugly 3.
Maybe Eagan Jones isn't independent but they are about two years a head of the fascist controlled agencies.
SHOULD WE ASK THE YANKEES WHO CREATED THESE AGENCIES IN THE FIRST PLACE AND WHAT WERE THEIR INTENTIONS WITH SUCH THING?
Excuse me sir, but your caps lock appears to be stuck.
best response today!! Still wiping the coffee from my keyboard....
Obviously, the poster in question is an advocate of the Inverse Rooseveltian Motto: "Speak Loudly and Carry a Small Stick".
Rating agencies getting no love
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egrgy2a0cvo
You know, now that Fiddy and Oprah have made up, all is right with the world.
no love for you !
No sir, you don't have cancer. Here, have an aspirine.
The new ratings:
AAA
BBB
MIC
KEY
MOU
SE
The truth hurts!
Not that the ratings agencies are actually telling the truth yet. Their rating are far too optimistic. But a tiny amount of truth is starting to creep into some of the ratings.
If the ratings agencies were rating the health of Francisco Franco, they would probably rate his condition as 'serious'.
Why don't do they do like America and coerce them into putting puppets in like the US did with S&P after they downgraded the US? Not to mention the SEC suing Egan Jones... Funny that it's the US using mafia tactics, not Europe...
Because they do not like their dirty laundry being aired in public....the curtain of secrecy will be closed. No more internal information being audited by the rating agencies.
They feel like it's now time to follow good advice. "Better to be thought a fool rather than open your mouth and be proven to be one".
This is not a good sign.
Too bad. Would have been nice to see the ESM have AAA, for a week or so.
Hahaha!
if you enjoyed nigel, check this out >---> Saving the Euro axelM
doya think they go so fas as allowing traders to short the ratings companies' and the parent companies' stocks? L0L!!!
moody's, wholly-owned by warrenB can be shorted thru it's appropriate current berkshireH holding scheme and maybe shorting g/sachs just as a side dish too?
this is war? more jello! togaParty tonight! double-secret ratings for sale! will trade for deviant sex! and digital money! bigger bathtubs! clothing optional! code 10!
Yep. This is one of the milestones on the way to fiscal stewardship hell. We are actually a little ahead of schedule.
in a tersely worded response to Euro Banks Moody's closed by saying, "Moody's no es Egan Jones,perras".
ISDA contracts have triggers relating to rating - will this trigger off deriviatives???
Triggered? I'll bet the word will be "nullified."
As with Dimon and registration with CFTC, if the players enter the field wearing numberless uniforms, they can not possibly be whistled off (which requires registering a whistle with the proper authorities specifying which number committed the infraction). As such, if there is no rating, there is no way to determine that a credit event may take place. See? Everything works precisely the way it should.
If you need me I'll be in my iron lung.
When they get rid of the rating agencies the banks will then be able to rate themselves and each other.
Or maybe governments will set up public rating agencies, that should work really well.
Regardless we will find ourselves even further down the Statist propaganda rabbit hole, at the bottom of which awaits the destroyer of the world.
Pots and fuckin kettles.
For start triple AAA to Greece :)
Just as though it was ripped from Atlas Shrugged...
Collectivism (or in this case the benefits from being apart of) was great for the Europeans as they enjoyed decades of high ratings from western-dominated (collectivist, favor-based) rating agencies. But when the collective power or pull turns against their favor... they complain as they get to taste what it is like on the other side (non-AAA) or as the minority.
Ok so they want to ditch the only thing that gives some illusion of legitimacy to themselves and continue with thier mark to fantasy balance sheets? Oh yeah, that will end well.
"Ratings? We don't need to show no stinking ratings!"
No, no, he said "Bridges, we don't need no steenkeen bridges". Right?
Fuck yo couch!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcJkhSUSnek
Bit players in a larger drama...
Wouldn't a boycott make the rating agencies independent?
Who rates the ratings agencies? What a farce!!!
These guys, and the professional accounting world, COMPLETELY sold out and became rubber stamps that sold to the highest bidder. The fact they are still in business and none of their management in jail is a real statement on how corrupt our political system is.
The Republic is long gone, the rule of law is long gone....we are just sitting by watching the wealth of western civilization being looted. (actually, we are not even watching the looters, but rather watching the idiot box)
Where is the anger? Where is the revolutionary spirit?
Whar's my free stuff?
*yawns*
*scratches balls*
*walks away from ESPN to put on suit and prepare to swagger into presidential conference*
s
Who rates the ratings agencies?
...better yet, who pays the ratings agencies.
the only thing less legitimate than a bank rating a bank is a congressman questioning one
Good one...
can you feel the communism pushing down on the globe
No
No, but man, what I would give for just a little sniff of anarchy to lead us back towards a constitutional republic.
Watch this video on the (arguable) differences between types of governments.
if you meant criminals, then yes
The hilarious part of this will be when the EU creates its' own rating agency (it has threatened to do so before).
Who will believe anything it says?
You think there will be a rush to buy sovereign bonds?
Of course! Every broke country buys every others' broke bonds.
Musical chairs for insane!
The real fun will happen when the music stops and they discover THERE ARE NO CHAIRS!
Then they'll create chair derivatives. Just you watch.
And fill them with hypothecated asses, no?
Hilarious
SDC's Special Drawn Chair's...made from the finest paper in the world, just don't let Merkel sit down first.
A quote I've seen:
"We can't rule anything out after all that we have seen. The elites and the legacy institutions are fighting for their very survival".
They'll try every dirty, slimy, underhanded trick to keep their fiat money & the power that goes with it.
So now running blind folded off the cliff makes it better...
And if everyone runs blindfolded off of a cliff, well by God, then we better too!
Hey, akak.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A24Q0IXy5zw
If you look very closely, you can see that most of the cliff-diving lemmings are carrying iPhones, too.
Blind mass suicide: there's an ap for that!
I couldn't agree more. They should go to Egan Jones to get their ratings.
This is a tough one, don't know who to root for. Dirt bag banks verus dirt bag rating agencies (minus Egan of course)
as someone said yesterday, why can't we hate them both
RICO does take more than one player
*wink* *wink*
*nudge* *nudge*
"YaknowwhatImean?"
I don't see any reason all the major banks shouldn't be Triple A rated--since with the exception of Iceland all the industrialized countries have decided that saving these banks is more important than saving their economies.
K, as a stupid ZH sneaker, I'm pretty glad that EU-cleptocrats didn't mention Egan Jones or Dagong.
:-P
Okay, okay! I paid them to downgrade these banks. You not happy? :(
FreeCreditReport.com
Because your willingness and ability to go into debt is the best measure of financial stability and posession of real capital.
Nevermind your income or propensity to gamble your paycheck; debt = solvency.
(lending at 3% and borrowing at 7% = winning, etc.)
I love the headlines....
yesterday morning as stocks started to drop "Spain is a problem...bailout may not help"
yesterday afternoon as the primary dealers ramped stocks "Stocks rise as Spanish yields recover some of their losses"
These guys have so many fingers in so many dykes they don't know what to do other than spew out the same old lines and pray that the gravy train keeps going.
At least one finger is upper US. Or maybe a fist.
First they rate everybody multiple As (including National Bank of Moldavia and Transvilvania's bonds), and now they are junking everybody. I don't have the problem with lowering the ratings, but the timing seems very odious. As if they want to speed up the collision. Something odd is happening behind the curtains. Perhaps the wizard is impotent after all...
I think it's fear of legal action if these banks crumble while the rating agencies are giving them green lights. The rating agencies got away with this once already, asking for a second chance could be a bad bet.
Just ask who profits. It has nothing to do with "got away with". Look to MF Global as an example.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/the-germans-have-learned-nothing-from-history-a-838429.html
I found this a good read with level headed insights. I was just chatting with some colleagues about the "what if" scenario that has captured most of our attention, that of "what happens if the world financial system totally collapses?" Funny to hear how the first reaction is that it won't happen and then the next thing they said was "well, we'd be out of work, wouldn't we"? You could hear that other foot drop from the far side of the moon. My feeling was that the world as it is turning now has an increasing % chance of this happening within 3 years or less. I said, look, if during the 2008-9 period the biggest US banks and brokerages would not loan to each other because of a lack of trust, what would happen if the average investor / bank depositor in the Western world decides that they had better pull everything out before the house burns down? what is to stop the contagion? Nothing....all it takes is a wholesale change of mind and the withdrawals out of Spanish and Greek banks seems to me to be the opening act. The later numbers in this opera will bring the house down.
All rating agencies are still just collectivist organizations. Everyone should do their own due diligence and decide for themselves. I don’t know about you, but I would not hand over my brain and my decision-making function and base my decisions on beauty contest rates to any group-think agency.
Handing over personal responsibility is the equivalent to giving away your liberty/freedom and your brain/ego (your free-will and your ability to decide and choose). To let government, union, corporation, church, organization, or any group take responsibility for you and for your actions/consequences, is to hand your ”self” over to "them" and thus ultimately become dependent and enslaved to "them."
Hear hear!
Speaking of collectivist entities, never forget some of the worst ones of all: insurance agencies. Or, as I like to think of them as, consumer fleecing agencies.
How about upgrades?
All banks are just minions of the elite. The layers of secrecy are unraveling and they are begining to show their true colors. Truth, they dont give a crap wat the masses think about them because they have the power. They hold the world hostage with their threats and worthless paper.
The secrecy and ambiguity are essential, so they kind of care what the masses think.
I guess the UN will take over this role.
For me, this behavior is natural. Many Europeans are still at the stage of psychological denial. I returned a few days in Europe and my conclusion is that they refuse to accept that they have a generalized seizure. At first they said that this situacon appeared only in boys and peripheral countries like Portugal, Greece and Ireland. Now it was the turn of the Spaniards. What happens is that the Spaniards are Latinos, and little disorganized workers. Then will say that the Italians are undisciplined and that Berlusconi did a bad job. When your turn to France, as resources will not have any bailout. At the stage of denial, we look to blame for what is said. For this, the big three agencies are perfect.
Will the US Fed Bailout Europe Without US Voter Approval?
= trial balloon.
When garbage has been rated at AAA for decades, there's only one direction the ratings can go. These ratings agencies are tools of the very same people who will be bailing Europe out. So good luck with all of that.
When do these banks start crying?
I thought Rajoy was a crybaby!
Classic kill the messenger.
Fluff me, baby...
formatting error
"Moooom, Jimmie called me a poopy-head and won't play with me."
"That's fine dear...You ARE a poopy-head."
"I hate you Mom, and I hope Jimmie dies."
The Euro-Family Saga.
The ratings agencies have been slow to do their jobs but every downgrade they've done is deserved. US government debt should be at junk status right now.
tools on the upside and the downside: India case and point. all part of the machinery
Let the hunting season begin! Off with the heads of the ones that graded toxic MBS as OK.