he Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has discovered "apparent failures" at 10 credit rating agencies. It said it was concerned that the agencies - including Standard & Poor's (S&P) and Moody's - were not making timely and accurate disclosures or managing conflicts of interest. The SEC said it expected the agencies to "address the concerns". Credit rating agencies have been criticised for their role in the financial crisis that started in 2007. This is because a root cause of the crisis was the bad US mortgage debt that was resold around the world, debt that was given top credit ratings by the agencies. The agencies were accused of having conflicts of interest, because they were paid by the banks that sold the
Read more on this story--->BBC News - SEC finds at credit rating agencies