moodys

After an exhaustive examination, DailyFinance's legal reporter comes to a clear verdict. Banks have done three things to create the massive glut of foreclosures choking America's legal systems and laying waste to its real estate markets.

Moody's Investors Service and Standard & Poor's are both considering downgrading their ratings on U.S. debt because of rising interest-to-revenue ratios, the nation's jobless recovery, and rising Social Security and health care costs, among other factors, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.

France could lose its top AAA credit rating as Europe's debt crisis spreads, Bloomberg News reported. "If problems in the euro zone aren't solved quickly, then the conditions of refinancing will be expensive for these countries and the ratings agencies will do more downgrades," Ralf Ahrens, who...

Just as the euro has begun recovering from Ireland's meltdown, another financial crisis is brewing in Spain. The country could be headed for a bailout or reorganization, experts say. How low could the euro go?

Moody's downgrades Hungary's sovereign credit rating by two notches to near junk on concern that the temporary measures the government is taking to address budget issues won't be sustainable.

Meredith Whitney, an analyst who rose to fame as one of the few people who predicted the financial crisis ahead of time, now plans to from a new credit agency, the Financial Times reports.

A day after Moody's Investors Service announced it was putting Ireland under review for a possible downgrade, Fitch Ratings lowered the country's credit grade to A from AA-. Fitch's downgrade was prompted by the government's announcement last week it is pledging more money -- as much as %u20AC50 billion -- to save Ireland's banks, in addition to uncertainty over the country's economic recovery.

Less than a week after downgrading Spain's credit rating, Moody's Investors Service warned it might cut Ireland's credit rating as well. Moody's said its decision to review Ireland's rating was prompted by the government's announcement last week that it was pledging more money -- as much as %u20AC50 billion -- to save the country's banks, as well as the weak economic recovery and rising borrowing costs.

The mortgage-backed securities meltdown whose effects still haunt our economy sprang from a simple cause: The rules of the game gave big incentives to every player involved to ignore the problems and keep collecting their fees. And despite financial reform, those rules haven't changed much.

The government of British Prime Minister David Cameron won a key vote of confidence from the financial community Monday when Moody's Investors Services announced that it would continue to apply a AAA rating to the country's debt, despite its severe economic dislocation.