Political Quotes

“Forty pages of our bill are exclusively dedicated to rating agencies. We spent an inordinate amount of time on the rating agency question. This is a complex issue and the source of a lot of discomfort. There is a headline in one of the national newspapers this morning that talks about the rating agencies and the problems they have posed in giving ratings to products that were worth vastly less than their claims. Very briefly, on the underlying bill, the SEC will have a new office of credit ratings to regulate and promote accuracy in ratings, staffed with experts in structured, corporate, and municipal debt finance. The office's own examination staff will conduct annual inspections, and the essential findings will be available to the public. The SEC will have expanded authority to suspend the registration of agencies that consistently produce ratings without integrity. It will have more authority to sanction ratings agencies that violate the law, including penalties for management for failure to supervise employees who break the law. The bill imposes tough new requirements on credit rating agencies.”