The Smartest Girls In The Room | The Global Mail: Justice Jagot found that Standard & Poor’s was negligent, as it owed a duty of care to investors and did not have reasonable grounds for assigning the AAA rating. Most significantly, the court found that Standard & Poor’s could not hide behind its disclaimers which say the AAA rating was merely an opinion.
The effect of the judgment — in Australia at least — is to make international ratings agencies directly liable to investors for their ratings.
That is a world first.
Standard & Poor’s has rejected the judgment and defended its rating methodology.
It is appealing the decision.