Update from David P. Hersh on the fight against Rating Agencies скачать в хорошем качестве

Update from David P. Hersh on the fight against Rating Agencies

Transcription: Hi, I'm Dave Hersh, a senior shareholder at Burg Simpson Eldredge Hersh & Jardine, and a co-chair of our commercial litigation department. I'm here to talk to you today about a recent news story you may have seen where the Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit against Standard & Poor's, one of the largest rating agencies in the world. The lawsuit filed by the Department of Justice relates to fraudulent actions by the rating agencies wherein they rated investment vehicles falsely, causing investors to lose millions and potentially billions of dollars in value. Here at Burg Simpson, we welcome the Department of Justice deciding to join the fray. As you may know, we've been involved in representing a number of clients, including municipalities, states, retirement organizations, public investors, hedge funds; all sorts of investors for the last several years who have lost money as a result of the fraud committed by the rating agencies and by the issuers. We're gratified that the Department of Justice has finally decided to enter the fray with this civil lawsuit against Standard & Poor's, as well as the fact that at the present time 13 states' Attorneys General have decided to join the federal lawsuit. For the last 5 years, the lawyers at Burg Simpson have been pursuing a number of cases around the country against the rating agencies and the issuers as a result of the fraud that was perpetrated against the investing public. In the course of this litigation--including litigation where we represent the Treasurer and the retirement fund for the state of Wyoming, and a number of hedge funds and other investment entities--we have discovered a large number of email and confidential documents that demonstrate the culpability of the rating agencies. We have evidence--testimonial as well as documentary--that shows rating agencies were involved in not only rating these securities improperly, maintaining those investments at an improper level, and then refusing to downgrade the securities as necessary without first giving secret, "heads up" information to the investment banks so that they could liquidate the positions of the investors. Burg Simpson has been at the cutting edge of this fraud investigation and litigation, and we're glad to see the Department of Justice joining in. At Burg Simpson, we anticipate that the recent actions by the Department of Justice--and the fact that 13 states' Attorneys General have decided to join in--are likely to continue to widen the reach of these investigations. We further anticipate that in addition to Standard & Poor's, the defendant in the recent Department of Justice lawsuit, that other Attorneys General and the U.S. Department of Justice will continue to target other major rating agencies such as Moody's or Fitch for their involvement in the massive fraud that has been perpetrated against investors. This would be entirely consistent with the information that the Burg Simpson team has uncovered in our investigations and our various lawsuits where the culpability of all 3 of the major rating agencies--not only Standard & Poor's but also Moody's and Fitch--has been demonstrated. We anticipate that in the coming months, further information will come to light and will become public that demonstrates all 3 of the rating agencies were actively involved in providing fraudulent information which resulted in the millions and billions of dollars of losses to investors. If you'd like further information about this situation, or information rating to the current lawsuits that are preparing to go forward to a trial, please feel free to contact me either by telephone or by email, Dave Hersh, and you can contact me at 303.792.5595 or http://business-law.burgsimpson.com. The lawyers on our trial team stand ready to help you and provide assistance in any way that we can. ********************************* Keep up-to-date with this litigation: http://business-law.burgsimpson.com/c...