Asset-Backed Paper Drops After Sigma SIV Loses A1 Rating

The market for short-term debt backed by assets including mortgages and car loans shrank the most in two months following the loss of a top credit rating on a $40 billion structured investment vehicle.

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``What you're probably seeing here is the fallout from the downgrade of Gordian Knot's Sigma Fund,'' said Garret Sloan, a short-term debt analyst at Wachovia Corp. in Charlotte, North Carolina. ``Without their AAA rating, they are going to have a very hard time selling to money markets.''