From Naked Capitalism:

The nation’s three dominant credit-ratings providers have made an urgent new request of their clients: Please don’t use our credit ratings.

The odd plea is emerging as the first consequence of the financial overhaul that is to be signed into law by President Obama on Wednesday. And it already is creating havoc in the bond markets, parts of which are shutting down in response to the request.

This is some great news for your money. Most of the FinReform bill is worthless.

Liability: Investors can bring private rights of action against ratings agencies for a knowing or reckless failure to conduct a reasonable investigation of the facts or to obtain analysis from an independent source. NRSROs will now be subject to “expert liability” with the nullification of Rule 436(g) which provides an exemption for credit ratings provided by NRSROs from being considered a part of the registration statement.

In English that meant the credit ratings agencies had to be used by say, your pension plan or mutual fund as a reason to invest in a particular asset. However – if the ratings agency was wrong with their rating they could not be sued nor held liable. So – obviously there was pressure for them to, let’s say, not tell the truth to get business.