S&P downgrades 7 Italian banks! Moody’s Downgrade BofA, Wells Fargo And CitiGroup!

• The financial quakes are coming fast and furious. Practically all major western banks are insolvent. S&P and Moody’s can no longer pull wool over investors eyes for a long time. They have lost credibility with the sub-prime mortgage debacle. These banks should really be rated as junk!
  –
  S&P downgrades 7 Italian banks
  ROME (AP) — Standard & Poor’s said Wednesday that it had downgraded seven Italian banks because of sovereign debt risk, a day after the agency downgraded Italy’s credit rating.
  –
  The cut targeted leading banks Mediobanca SpA and Intesa Sanpaolo SpA, as well as Findomestic Banca SpA, Banca IMI SpA, Banca Nazionale del Lavoro SpA, Banca Infrastrutture Innovazione e Sviluppo SpA and Cassa di Risparmio in Bologna SpA.
  –
  The agency said it was assigning negative outlooks to the long-term ratings on these seven banks. It was also revising its outlooks from stable to negative on eight other Italian banks, including Unicredit.
  –
  “The negative outlooks on the long-term ratings on the 15 banks reflect the possibility that we could lower their ratings, all other things being equal, should we further lower our ratings on the Republic of Italy,” S&P said in a statement.
  –
  This week, S&P downgraded Italian sovereign bonds to A from A+ — reinforcing fears that Italy, with the second-highest debt burden in the eurozone after Greece, is getting drawn into Europe’s debt crisis.
  –
  BofA, Wells Fargo Downgraded by Moody’s
  By Hugh Son, Dakin Campbell and Donal Griffin, http://www.bloomberg.com/
  Bank of America Corp. (BAC) and Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC) had long-term credit ratings downgraded by Moody’s Investors Service, which said U.S. support has become less likely if lenders get into financial trouble.
  –
  Citigroup Inc. (C)’s short-term rating also was cut by Moody’s, which said today “there is an increased possibility that the government might allow a large financial institution to fail, taking the view that contagion could be limited.” Citigroup’s stand-alone credit has improved, Moody’s said in a statement, leading the service to confirm the bank’s long-term rating.
  –
  The downgrade questions whether the largest banks will always be “too big to fail,” a status conferred in 2008 when they received government rescues to keep the financial system from collapsing. Lawmakers have since overhauled regulations to head off a repeat of the bailouts and ordered regulators to set up a system for seizing and dismantling banks that founder.
  –
  Bank of America, the biggest U.S. lender by assets, had its ratings cut two levels to Baa1 from A2 for long-term senior debt, and to Prime-2 from Prime-1 for short-term debt, Moody’s said. The outlook for long-term senior ratings at the Charlotte, North Carolina-based company remains negative, indicating another cut may be ahead.

end