Free Republic

** EXCERPT ** The Securities and Exchange Commission has a list, and it's checking it twice. It's a compendium of nearly 1,000 companies the so-called watchdog has now pronounced off-limits to short-selling. If this do-not-short list weren't such a travesty, it would be hilarious. Among the companies the SEC wants to "protect" are the ones -- Moody's and McGraw-Hill, to name just two -- that did such a horrendous job rating the mortgage paper that helped cause this debacle in the first place. In the end, SEC Chairman Chris Cox and friends will discover that this will turn out to...

Ambac, MBIA fall as Moody's warns it may cut again Ratings agency says losses on subprime mortgage securities to be much worse By Alistair Barr, MarketWatch Last update: 5:55 p.m. EDT Sept. 19, 2008 SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Ambac Financial and MBIA Inc. shares fell on Friday after Moody's Investors Service warned it may downgrade the beleaguered bond insurers again. Despite short selling being banned on Ambac starting Friday, shares of the two companies fell 42% and 8% respectively during afternoon trading. Moody's put the ratings of Ambac's and MBIA's main bond insurance units on review for a possible downgrade....

The Financial Times business newspaper reported Wednesday that Moody's wrongly assigned triple-A ratings to complex European debt products called constant proportion debt obligations, or CPDOs. Moody's said it rated 44 European CPDO tranches totaling about $4 billion. It said it also hired a law firm to conduct an external investigation into why the coding error in a computer model caused the products to be given a rating four notches higher than they merited.

** EXCERPT ** SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) - Moody's Investors Service said late Tuesday it placed the New York Times Co.'s Baa1 senior unsecured and Prime-2 commercial paper ratings on review for possible downgrade.

(English-language translation) Moody's degraded Puerto Rico's credit rating today, thus aggravating the crisis that has left 90,000 public employees in the island without a job. "This action reflects Puerto Rico's tense financial situation, the continuing political conflict, and the lack of agreement to [take] the necessary measures to end years of financial deterioration by the government," Moody's stated in a release. The majority of the bonds, which were [originally] classified "Baa2", decreased to "Baa3", which is the limit for bonds [considered] healthy for investment. However, according to Secretary of the Governor's Office Aníbal José Torres, the ratings firm degraded some...

NEW YORK, April 20 (Reuters) - Moody's Investors Service on Thursday cut both Knight Ridder Inc. (KRI.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and McClatchy Co. (MNI.N: Quote, Profile, Research) to junk status, citing McClatchy's acquisition of its bigger rival newspaper publisher. In mid-March, No. 9 U.S. newspaper publisher McClatchy said it would buy Knight-Ridder Inc. for $4.5 billion to become the second-largest U.S. newspaper chain. Downgrades, particularly to junk, tend to raise a company's borrowing costs. Moody's cut both Knight Ridder and McClatchy's bond ratings to the top junk level of "Ba1" from the bottom investment-grade rating of "Baa3." The new combined...

What's wrong with this picture? This month, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called the state's pension system "another financial train on another track to disaster" and proposed replacing the state's defined-benefit plans with a defined contribution for state employees hired after June 30, 2006. He also proposed a carrot and stick to entice current employees to opt out of the system starting next year. Yet last week, Moody's Investors Service gave the California Public Employees' Retirement System its highest, Aaa credit rating for a new business CalPERS is entering: Using its pension-fund assets to guarantee municipal bonds issued by states, counties and...

In the final days of Governor Gray Davis' tenure, it seemed like the sun had set on California once and for all. After his 2002 reelection, Davis had announced that California was confronted with a deficit of $35 billion -- caused in large part by a gargantuan spending increase of 36% during his years in office, and an explosion of hiring in the public sector, whose unions were among Davis' most reliable supporters. Among the people of California, there was an increasing sense that perhaps the state's problems were insurmountable and that the state itself, controlled by Davis and a...

FRANKFURT - The shock waves from last week's arrest of the Russian billionaire Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky have spread widely, but not evenly, through the club of international investors. Here in Germany, Russia's largest trading partner, large-scale investors said that they remained committed to the country. That is hardly surprising, given that they have poured billions of euros into energy-distribution deals, pipeline projects and even equity investments in Russian companies. But experts say would-be investors within Europe, particularly midsize companies, are likely to shelve their plans until the legal storm surrounding Mr. Khodorkovsky and his oil company, Yukos, dies down. "This...

Moody's has lowered the rating on $21.9 billion of outstanding State of California General Obligation bonds to A2 (with a stable outlook) from A1, and assigns this rating to the state's upcoming $900 million general obligation bond sale. In addition, we have lowered the rating on $5.5 billion in lease revenue bonds from A2 to A3. These rating actions reflect the magnitude of the imbalance between the state's revenues and expenditures, and the expectation the state will not be able to sufficiently address the imbalance in the upcoming fiscal year _ given the inherent obstacles to reaching consensus on solutions...

Opinion NEW YORK, Aug 19, 2002 -- Moody's has downgraded the state of North Carolina's General Obligation rating to Aa1, from Aaa, affecting $3.5 billion of long-term debt. The rating change reflects the state's continued budget pressure, its reliance on non-recurring revenues, and its weakened balance sheet. The task of restoring structural budget balance and rebuilding reserves faces political and economic obstacles. The state is considering actions which over time could help to restore fiscal stability and rebuild reserves. Future rating considerations will take into account the state's economic and fiscal progress and the impact on future financial results. The...

 Weekday Commentary from Jim Puplava Home Still Looks Like a Bear Market for the S&P Gold & Silver Breakout The Week in Graphs  Tuesday's Market Scoreboard  March 26, 2002  Dow Industrials 71.69 10,353.36  Dow Utilities 1.54 302.22  Dow Transports 58.14 2875.37  S & P 500 6.62 1138.49  Nasdaq 11.68 1824.17  US Dollar to Yen   132.905  US Dollar to Euro   .8772  Gold 0.9 296.8  Silver .005 4.585  Oil .37 25.36  CRB Index .15 203.52  Natural Gas .015 3.472 All market indexes Storm Watch Geopolitical News in Focus Energy Resource Page Precious Metals           Storm...