The agencies and what they do -- How to think about the agencies -- The agencies and financial innovation -- Cogs in the wheel of financial destruction -- Aftermath -- Addendum: convenient villains & all-purpose bogeymen -- I'll be gone. You'll be gone.

The demand for sovereign ratings has increased throughout last decades. Until the1990's, credit rating agencies (CRAs) did not rate most of the emerging markets and the focus was almost only on developed countries, however, during this decade the number of sovereigns rated increased dramatically...

This paper links the current sub-prime mortgage crisis to a decline in lending standards associated with the rapid expansion of this market. We show that lending standards declined more in areas that experienced larger credit booms and house price increases. We also find that the underlying...