Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor (slightly modified)

 

This was a systematic and aggressive strategy to replace a culture that was very conservative, an accuracy-and-quality oriented [culture], a getting-the-rating-right kind of culture, with a culture that was supposed to be ‘business-friendly,’ but was consistently less likely to assign a rating that was tougher than our competitors.

Mark Froeba, former senior vice president at Moody’s Investors Service, on what caused the ratings agency to make so many mistakes when rating toxic debt, in How Moody’s sold its ratings — and sold out investors.  One of the things that I think is largely overlooked in reporting on the financial crisis is the role of the ratings agencies. [via Tim Bray]

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