08/11/10 New York, New York — What you already know about China-based Dagong Credit Rating is that it’s caused quite the kerfuffle over sovereign debt ratings by ranking China higher than the US and other developed countries, like the UK and Japan, based on a formula assigning more weight to the fiscal health and GDP growth of countries.
What you may not know is that last year Dagong officially applied to the SEC to become a Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organization (NRSRO), of which now there are only 10 (all of which are either North America- or Japan-based), and now claims to be getting the run around.
According to Fortune:
“This is stirring stuff. But as is often the case with news out of China, the latest Dagong statement itself is a bit of a riddle. Has the firm actually been rejected, as it contends, or is Dagong simply posturing?
“An outright U.S. rejection seems unlikely. The firm applied in December 2009 with the Securities and Exchange Commission for status as a Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organization, or NRSRO – the designation under which Moody’s, S&P, Fitch and several other agencies have registered with the SEC.
“Dagong sought the NRSRO label even though it has no U.S. offices, rates no U.S. companies and has no U.S. customers. As a result, the SEC said it would have to hold hearings to determine ‘whether Dagong has a sufficient connection with U.S. interstate commerce to register as an NRSRO.’
“In April, the SEC said it aimed to settle the question by July, but the next month the commission extended that deadline to Sept. 23. The commission hasn’t issued a ruling, an SEC spokesman said Wednesday, and isn’t likely to do so till September — which seems to rule out the ‘rejection’ the China Daily article speaks of.”
Part of what’s interesting about this latest twist is that Dagong, which makes the point of having “global” in its name, wants to be “nationally recognized” in the US despite, as noted above, having little connection to the nation. Of course, the NRSRO agencies – well, at least Moody’s, Standard & Poor’s, and Fitch Ratings — have influence far beyond US borders… and at least Canada and Japan have both jumped on the NRSRO bandwagon… but it’s hard to see what advantages they’ve gained as foreign organizations designated NRSROs.
You can read more details in Fortune’s coverage of how China’s Dagong says the US rejects it.
Best,
Rocky Vega,
The Daily Reckoning
Rocky Vega
Rocky Vega is publisher of Agora Financial International, where he advances the growth of Agora Financial publishing enterprises outside of the US. Previously, he was publisher of The Daily Reckoning, and founding publisher of both UrbanTurf and RFID Update -- which he ran from Brazil, Chile, and Puerto Rico -- as well as associate publisher of FierceFinance. Rocky has an honors MS from the Stockholm School of Economics and an honors BA from Harvard University, where he served on the board of directors for Let’s Go Publications, Harvard Student Agencies, and The Harvard Advocate.
The Daily Reckoning is your premier source for making sense of the news Washington and Wall Street generate. Each business day, The Daily Reckoning calls on its stable of world-class writers and thinkers to show you how to get ahead.
Start your 100% FREE subscription to The Daily Reckoning today and you’ll get a free research report, “How to Survive the Fall of Social Security.” Simply enter your email address below to get your free report and join over 495,000 worldwide Daily Reckoning subscribers!
We Respect Your Privacy and We will
Never Share or Sell Your Email Address
The present rating agencies (S&P, Moody’s et al) seems to suffer from a conflict of interest – they get paid by the same corporations to rate them. And dare they rate the US as it is? Not unless they want to commit financial suicide.
So, if Dagong were to rate the US corporations on its own (paid for by users), it would be more objective than what we have now. The sooner the SEC grant NRSRO status the better. More competition (after all, the US likes to claim that it is an open market) and a different perspective will make the ratings less biased, thereby benefiting the general public.