ESMA Authorized Credit Rating Agencies

In the period leading up to the financial crisis in 2008, 2010 and so on, the European Commission considered to strengthen the regulatory and supervisory framework for Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs) in the European Union (EU), to restore market confidence and increase investor protection:

(1) The first set of rules, which entered into force at the end of 2009, established a regulatory framework for Credit Rating Agencies and introduced a regulatory oversight regime, whereby Credit Rating Agencies had to be registered and were supervised by national competent authorities. In addition, Credit Rating Agencies were required to avoid conflicts of interest, and to have sound rating methodologies and transparent rating activities.
(2) In 2011, these rules were amended to take into account the creation of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), which supervised Credit Rating Agencies registered in the European Union.
(3) A further amendment was made in 2013 to reinforce the rules and address weaknesses related to sovereign debt credit ratings.

The competent authorities publish lists of the Credit Rating Agencies that they have recognized or certified. For various reasons, these are not always visible, such as on Monday, July 27, 2020 @ 09:00 – the relevant page of the website of the European Securities and Markets Authority was not accessible to everybody. No matter, which device and which browser you are using, you would not get their information online. We therefore have lists of the data available to us here. In contrast to the official lists, our ones include links to Credit Rating Agencies’ websites. This makes it easy to get an overview of all recognized agencies and to contact Credit Rating Agencies. Please ask us for updates.

Our list is based on the publication of the European Securities and Markets Authority on June 18, 2020. The European Securities and Markets Authority’s last update of this list was on November 14, 2019.

Subscribe to get access

Read more of this content when you subscribe today.