Word: modeling
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...debate. On Wednesday it will host a roundtable discussion with the heads of both major and minor credit-rating agencies as well as investors and academic experts. "We're inviting a lot of the people who have had some very interesting ideas about what would be a better model," SEC chairwoman Mary Schapiro told Congress in March. "There have been some very thoughtful proposals put out there...
...center of the conversation is how ratings agencies get paid. Since the 1970s, the largest ratings agencies have been paid by the companies that issue bonds or securities. This "issuer-pay" model has been roundly criticized for leading the agencies to cozy up to the firms creating financial products - especially the complex ones - by assigning ratings that are more favorable than justified in order to hold on to the business. At the beginning of 2008, there were just 12 top-rated companies in the world, but some 64,000 structured finance instruments, like mortgage-related CDOs, won that seal...
Thousands have since been downgraded. "We need to consider alternatives to the issuer-pay model," SEC commissioner Elisse Walter said in a speech in March. One idea: level the playing field so that new competitors, like smaller agencies that charge investors instead of issuers, can better compete. Another option: a tax on investors, issuers or even the public at large in order to create a central pool of money with which to buy ratings to be made public. (See the best business deals...
...cash-for-clunkers really two-for-one? That depends. There are currently two main bills in the House and Senate, which, according to greens, are not created equal. One, sponsored by Democratic Ohio Representative Betty Sutton, allows any car from model year 2000 or earlier to be traded in, without any restriction on fuel economy. In return, car buyers will get $4,000 if they buy a new U.S. car that gets a minimum mileage of 27 m.p.g. and $5,000 if they buy a U.S. car with at least 30 m.p.g. Crucially, the new cars have to be made...
...still lacks an effective leader - House minority leader John Boehner and Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell don't exactly stir up a crowd - and it has a long way to go before it's in striking position to win back majorities in Congress. Judging by the Democrats' most recent model, the GOP is five months into a 12-year sentence. On the other hand, that's not bad compared with another historical parallel: the 40 years the party spent in the cold thanks to F.D.R...