Today’s post focuses on a passing article published in Bloomberg last week regarding the credit rating agencies and how they have survived the post-crisis regulatory era to remain as engrained as ever. As this author specialises in studying the regulation of this particular industry, this post serves as an indulgence, with the aim being to present an example of how the agencies operate and, crucially, why they persist in spite of such awful performance. Whilst some of the issues raised will be specific to the example promoted within the post, the underlying sentiment that rating agencies profit and develop when the economy is in decline is the one developed in this post and, in truth, in all of this author’s other work: when considered in that analytical light, it is an almost parasitic existence led by the leading rating agencies. The article in question, which presents an introductory account of the complex issue, begins by discussing how there has been a level of shock or ...