Credit rating agencies have been beaten up pretty thoroughly in the credit crunch. Many would say they have been discredited. If only they hadn't rated all those subprime-backed CDOs AAA! In the wake of the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, Advisor Perspectives notes that on Friday, just before the pyrotechnics began, Standard & Poor's had Lehman's operating groups rated A+. At an event, Standard & Poor's analyst Scott Sprinzen said that "we don't expect Lehman to fail." And: "The underlying business at Lehman is doing pretty well." And: Its "basic business franchise is not impaired." It also had Merrill Lynch rated similarly high, just a notch below Morgan Stanley, and two notches below Goldman Sachs. They did not anticipate the possibility of extraordinary events, or "accidents."  

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