Word: majors
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Last July, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) put out a report detailing how the major credit-ratings agencies abetted the subprime-mortgage meltdown. By wildly overestimating the quality of the dicey securities that Wall Street was churning out, the ratings firms helped investors load up on those securities - the same ones that are now, in many cases, near-worthless and clogging up the financial system. Plenty of people at the ratings agencies were aware of trouble brewing. In December 2006, a manager at Standard & Poor's e-mailed a colleague: "Let's hope we are all retired and wealthy...
...have their own debt rated, therefore creating a massive conflict of interest for the ratings agencies, which want to hold onto that business. (See "How to Know When the Economy Is Turning Up".) Favorably rating structured finance products - including Frankenstein creations like synthetic collateralized debt obligations - became a major source of profits for the ratings agencies during the boom years. By mid-2007, some 37,000 issues earned top marks; thousands have since been downgraded...
...Switzerland's one step further along. In an effort to fend off the threat of deflation, the Swiss National Bank announced March 12 it would dump francs in the first such move by a major central bank for years. The move was enough to cut 3% off the currency's value against the euro; since then, the franc's fallen further still. Even the greenback, which rallied in recent months, stands at its lowest level against the euro since early January following the Fed's announcement last week that it would spend some $1.2 trillion on government and mortgage bonds...
...quite optimistic with world-class players like Vloka and Mills,” Brand said. “We are looking forward to having them play major roles on our squad for the next three years. Noam has continued to develop and is getting better both on the world scene and on our squad. They are both setting their goals for the 2012 Olympic Games, so it will be fortunate to continue to have those forces on our team...
...billion to buy Ford Motor's lossmaking Jaguar and Land Rover (JLR) business. Since then, demand for luxury vehicles has tanked, sales of Tata Motors other models have softened, and the company faces a looming deadline to refinance $2 billion in loans for the JLR deal. "That's a major cash-flow crunch for them," Jajoo says. The company is pursuing several options: floating shares of Tata Motors, rolling over the JLR loan at a higher interest rate, and getting a bailout for JLR from the British government. "Tata Motors is progressing on the refinancing options and discussing with banks...