Word: fitch
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...financial crisis deepens, Asia has looked on nervously, but with little fear of getting dragged into the maelstrom. Asian financial institutions have generally avoided the kind of risky, subprime mortgage-related investments that have crippled financial firms in the U.S. and Europe. Fitch Ratings figures that at mid-year Asian banks accounted for only 6% of the total losses on subprime investments at the world's banks. (European banks, on the other hand, were responsible for 47%.) Even those financial institutions that carried some exposure - like Japan's Mizuho Financial Group, which has reported subprime-linked losses of more than...
...gotten better at preparing for hurricanes, with stricter building codes and well-rehearsed evacuation plans. But it's still dangerously exposed - not only to the elements, but to financial ruin. It's got the nation's most dysfunctional property insurance market, a byproduct of life in harm's way. Fitch's ratings agency concluded in March that if a big storm hits Florida, "the fragile market could effectively collapse...
...problem is, even those lower-priced options aren't cheap. Florida's prices remain higher than the national average - especially when you count sky-high property taxes and insurance premiums that can be as burdensome as mortgage payments - while its wages are lower. Fitch Ratings warned that when a big hurricane hits, Florida's insurance market "could effectively collapse." That won't jump-start a recovery...
...this shopping spree left the banks vulnerable to the whims of investors. By early 2008, the combination of a risk-averse global financial climate and possible speculative attacks on the krona meant that Iceland could no longer run itself like a hedge fund. Says Paul Rawkins, an analyst at Fitch Ratings: "The global credit crunch undermined their business model...
...certainly the worst in home loans, but the troubles in mortgage markets have caused investors to look at other securities a little more skeptically. There's no telling exactly what set off the sell-off in global stock markets, but a possible candidate was the Jan. 18 downgrading by Fitch Ratings of U.S. bond insurer Ambac. The insurer allows cities and other bond issuers to pay lower interest rates because their insured bonds are deemed virtually risk free. But now markets are beginning to question whether Ambac and other bond insurers are really solid enough to confer that kind...