# Professor Lawrence White Testifies Before the Senate on the Regulation of Credit Rating Agencies

1 Press Releases August 5, 2009 ![](/sites/default/files/styles/246w/public/assets/images/uat_024818.gif?itok=vyb0e6SV)>

On August 5, 2009, NYU Stern Professor [Lawrence White](http://w4.stern.nyu.edu/faculty/bio/lawrence-white) testified before the US Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs during a hearing on “Examining Proposals to Enhance the Regulation of Credit Rating Agencies.”

“\[The\] urge for greater regulation is understandable – but it is misguided and potentially quite harmful,” explained Professor White. “The heightened regulation of the rating agencies is likely to discourage entry, rigidify a specified set of structures and procedures, and discourage innovation in new ways of gathering and assessing information, new technologies, new methodologies and new models – and may well not achieve the goal of inducing better ratings from the agencies.”

An advocate for increased competition, he proposed the following:

- Eliminate regulatory reliance on ratings
- Eliminate the force of law that has been accorded to these third-party judgments
- Bring market forces to bear

[Read Prof. White's full testimony](/sites/default/files/assets/documents/uat_024615.pdf)