credit rating agencies

Plans for tougher regulation of credit rating agencies are due to be announced later by the European Commission.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee had a hearing Wednesday to investigate the role of credit rating agencies in the nation's worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

The committee is holding a series of hearings to examine how the financial meltdown began.

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A report into the much-criticised activities of credit rating agencies finds conflicts of interest at a number of firms.

Government officials urged credit rating agencies Wednesday to rethink the way they rate municipal bonds, arguing that it the current system saddles local governments and taxpayers with unnecessary costs.

Credit rating agencies are another section of the financial system under scrutiny. Those agencies helped to inflate the housing bubble.

David Wessel, economics editor of The Wall Street Journal, discusses what the agencies did wrong.

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After enduring months of scrutiny and attacks, the big three credit rating agencies came under fire once again Thursday, with critics charging that their recent efforts to shore up their shaken rating system are too little and too late.