I study whether commercial banks' loan loss allowances were inadequate during the 2008 financial crisis because bank managers relied on low-quality information to estimate loan losses. To measure the quality of information collected on bank-held mortgages prior to the crisis, I create a bank exposure-to-mortgage fraud risk index (EFI) that captures overstatement of borrower income in mortgage applications. I find banks that originated more loans in high-risk neighborhoods had less adequate loan loss allowances during the crisis. My study is consistent with the hypothesis that fraudulent borrower information adversely affected banks’ loan loss provisioning.

A country’s economic growth exhibits a significant response to sovereign rating changes: a one-notch upgrade (downgrade) causes an increase (decline) of about 0.6% (0.3%) in re-rated countries’ five-year average annual growth rates. The results hold after accounting for other determinants of economic growth and potential endogeneity problems, and are robust to the use of quarterly data. Changes in country rating affect economic growth via the interest-rate and capital-flow channels: narrower sovereign bond yield spreads and increased capital inflows are associated with upgrades, which stimulate re-rated countries’ economic performance, and the converse holds for downgrades.

Sovereign credit rating changes have an influence on real private investment of re-rated countries. We find significant increases in private investment growth following upgrades in sovereign ratings. These increases, however, are transitory. We also find significant, temporary declines in private investment growth following sovereign rating downgrades. The results hold after accounting for re-rated countries’ growth opportunities, endogeneity, and other factors that could affect private investment. The irreversible nature of investment may be the explanation for the temporary changes in the growth rates of physical capital investment associated with revisions in sovereign credit ratings.