S&P Pays $1.4 Billion|for Its Mortgage Ratings

(CN) - Standard & Poor's said Tuesday that it will pay $1.4 billion to settle charges of inflating ratings of mortgage investments that collapsed in the 2008 financial crisis.

Standard & Poor's did not have to admit wrongdoing in its settlement with the Department of Justice, 19 states and the District of Columbia.

In a separate settlement announced Tuesday, S&P agreed to pay $125 million to the California Public Employees Retirement System, for its ratings of three investments.

Neither settlement needs judicial approval.

After the United States sued Standard & Poor's two years ago, the ratings agency claimed it was dirty payback for S&P's lowering the government's credit rating after the federal government shutdown in a budget fight. It retracted that in the settlement.

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