They are saying that S&P, Moody’s, and Fitch do not manage conflicts of interest well, fail to follow internal procedure, business pressures to right highly, and so the ratings are generally a mess.
Of at least as much concern is the finding that the complex securities outstripped the agencies abilities to rate these instruments.
We literally have an economic system where no one, even the most tuned in and experienced operators, know what they are actually handling. It has gotten so far removed from real equities, and cut and diced and resold so many times, that only mathematical models which are unverifiable present any sort of model for value.
We aren’t even half way down the credit crunch slope. This is 1929 on crack.