The Plain Dealer, "Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray sues rating agencies Standard & Poor's, Moody's and Fitch over state pension fund losses"
Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray has filed suit against securities rating agencies Standard & Poor's, Moody's and Fitch as part of an ongoing effort to recover money for state pension funds that represent police, firefighters, teachers and state and local government workers.
The lawsuit alleges the agencies ignored their own policies to provide inflated ratings of mortgaged-backed investments because the agencies were trying to please issuers, who paid the agency lucrative fees not only to rate the investments, but in some cases, to structure them. The agencies' reliance on these fees, the suit said, "created the incentive to sacrifice ratings quality in order to keep the revenue stream from the structured finance machine flowing."
Lieff Cabraser is among the private law firms assisting the attorney general's office in the suit. Read the full article on the Cleveland Plain Dealer website.
