Bear Stearns Shakes the CDO Honey Pot

The Trainer Worthman CDO really was five securities, or tranches, rolled into one. Each piece of the CDO was reviewed by Moody's Investors Service and received varying degrees of investment grade ratings. This May, Moody's downgraded three tranches of the CDO with a combined value of $41 million. One tranche valued at $7.6 million was lowered to junk bond status.

The other two CDOs that Spitzer requested information on are Aspen Funding I and Madison Avenue Manufactured Housing Contract Trust 20002. The Madison Avenue deal involved mortgages on mobile homes that were originally issued by GreenPoint Financial and later sold to Bear Stearns' EMC Mortgage subsidiary.

Both the Aspen Funding and Madison Avenue deals were rated by either Moody's and S&P back in 2002. The rating agencies have since downgraded all or portions of both CDOs.