Dutch counsel confident of success as S&P faces new CPDO case

The fine handed out by an Australian court last year to ABN Amro and Standard & Poor’s was a rare success for post-crisis litigants in structured credit cases. The victors are hoping to repeat the trick in Europe – but what are their chances? Lukas Becker reports

Since the crisis, credit rating agencies have defended their work with one phrase: it’s only an opinion. That defence has seen off dozens of lawsuits, mostly in the US, but it finally came unstuck in the Australian Federal Court, which on November 5 became the first in the world to find one of the agencies liable for flawed structured credit ratings.

In a judgement containing more words than War and Peace – and almost as much drama – judge Jayne Jagot found Standard & Poor’s (S&P) and ABN Amro