President of S&P Steps Down and Citigroup COO Steps Up
August 23rd, 2011The healthy 55 year-old President of the S&P, Deven Sharma, will be stepping down from his position next month. He recently guided the S&P through their decision to downgrade the US’s credit rating from AAA to AA+, and has since been feeling external pressures that inevitably will push him out of office. Apparently an investigation has been underway over the S&P’s ratings of mortgage securities during the financial crisis, which could have “allegedly” lead to an error in downgrading the US’s credit status.
According to an article in the New York Times, Sharma had been considering his exit long before the controversy began with the credit downgrade and “improperly rated” mortgage securities. His exit is not from the company all together; he will continue through the rest of the year to oversee major changes that will be happening with S&P’s parent company McGraw-Hill. Who will be replacing him? It was suggested to have someone who is a “well-known independent oversight figure”.
Who better would fit that mold than the COO of Citigroup, Douglas Peterson? The same COO who participated in receiving billions of dollars during the financial bailouts of 2008. Sounds independent and unbias to me*…(please note sarcasm*).
An anonymous commentor on EconomicPolicyJournal.com (a blog friend of ours) put a reaction to this shift of power so brillianlty:
“You have to be mentally ill or intellectually dishonest or deficient not to notice this.”
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