Some subprime heads need to roll.

Sir, The Lex Column of July 11, with respect to the subprime-mortgage-backed-securities and the rating agencies affaire duly says “Could the rating agencies have acted sooner? Possibly. True, it is not their job to simply react to market moves”. Nonetheless the column opens by citing John Maynard Keynes with “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, Sir?” and this is highly inappropriate and exculpatory since the basic truth coming out is that there has been not one single factual change but only the discovery of some amazing sloppy job, not only by those issuing the subprime mortgages but also by those rating the resulting securities.

I have until now not heard a single word about one single credit rating employee fired because of such an obviously shoddy work and if there is no one made responsible at this stage the future will only set us up to even much worse result. I am not suggesting anything like the recent execution of a regulator in China for what there was a clear case of corruption but, figuratively speaking, some subprime heads got to roll too… and of course some wallets be emptied.