One of the underlying causes of the Securities meltdown are companies like Lewtan. They promise to post public data and reports that are published by financial institutions but hide or "mis-enter" negative info at the request of their partners. They work for the servicers not the investors as they claim.

Their modus operandi is to promise individual suppport, dedicated workers and quick turnaround. Then you sign the contract and you are invisible. I spoke to an employee there who confirmed they have a few staff that are identified as the dedicated workers. Once the contract is signed they are pulled from that client and become the dedicated staff for the next potential client in line. They have meetings to discuss when a client is 3 months out from renewal at which time they practice damage control, hire a dedicated staff, promise quicker turnaround, until the contract is signed and they move on... Their largest client, S&P, left them a few years back after paying over a million a year for almost a decade and watching promises crumble. (To be fair S&P also left because according to an analyst there, S&P discovered that Lewtan made the data S&P paid millions for available to competitors for 80% less since they had it anyway. The founder Steven Lewtan jumped ship at that point and sold the London Daily Mirror Group a tainted product.)


The current CEO Ira Keller is a marketing guy who lies and misdirects with the best. When the economy rose he and all the laid off former Thomson employees and family members he brought in were solely responsible for the companies fortunes. When the economy tanked and clients became selective and noticed the lies, faulty data and lack of ethics, he blamed everyone else for the downfall. They are now renaming slightly modified products and pushing the limits of the law (SEC regs say certain data has to be publicly published for the good of consumers - Lewtan offers a service where they will host it on a public website but bury the link in such a way that it takes even their internal employees shortcuts to find it).

Avoid doing business with Lewtan - ABSNet, ABS Discloser, etc. - until DMGI takes steps to clean up the mess, commit to data quality and agree to honor contracts and promises. This will probably require the removal of Keller and his Thomson friends but the corporate watchdog DMGI has at Lewtan is a Thomson alum and friend of Keller. Pay for Intex or Bloomberg but pass on this mess.