Politics, Financial Fraud and the “Big Three” Credit Ratings Agencies

China and Russia to Launch Credit Rating Agency that will Challenge U.S. Financial System

The “Big Three”Credit rating Agencies Moody’s, Standard & Poor’s and Fitch Ratings are a powerful monopoly and a very influential actor in the World of finance. Since 1975, these same rating agencies gained power with assistance from the U.S. government, with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) at the forefront and private firms who together wrote the rules so that these credit agencies can have a greater role in the financial markets for investment opportunities such as pension funds for example, that can only invest in an “investment grade” securities provided by the “Big Three.” The risk of investing in securities is therefore determined by the debt issuer whether a corporation, a bank-created entity, sovereign nation such as Russia or China will “most-likely” fail to make interest payments on the…