“Standard & Poor’s, the credit rating agency blamed with helping inflate the subprime mortgage bubble, has now settled accusations that it orchestrated a similar fraud years after the bubble burst.
S.&P. has agreed to settle an array of government investigations stemming from 2011, paying nearly $80 million and admitting to some of its misdeeds, federal and state authorities announced on Wednesday. As part of the deals, reached with the Securities and Exchange Commission and the attorneys general in New York and Massachusetts, S.&P. also agreed to take a one-year “timeout” from rating certain commercial mortgage investments at the heart of the case, an embarrassing blow to the rating agency.
… the Justice Department and several state attorneys general did [also] take action, suing S.&P. in connection with the crisis. After fighting that case for two years, S.&P. has now reached a tentative settlement that would require it to pay $1.37 billion, people briefed on the matter said this week, a penalty large enough to wipe out its operating profit for a year.