Credit rating agencies
A payer-conflicted assurance market that regulators chose to license and supervise rather than restructure. Outcomes in 2008 show the limits of disclosure and licensing without liability or competition.
Path signature
V voluntary D delegation T trigger O oversight T trigger I independence
Similarity of its opening to frontier AI: 0.44 (matched opening VDTOTI)
Stages reached
| Voluntary | 1909 |
| Trigger | 1970 |
| Mandate | not reached |
| Standards | not reached |
| Oversight | 1975 |
| Independence | 2010 |
| Access | not reached |
Mechanisms
| Before reform | Now | |
|---|---|---|
| pays | O | A |
| selects | O | A |
| access | shallow | deep |
| publishes | public | public |
| oversees | none | regulator |
Investor-pays until 1970; issuer-pays since, with SEC oversight after 2006 and 2010.
Payer, access, publication
Who pays. Issuer pays since the 1970s; investor-pays subscription model before that.
Access. Non-public issuer information under confidentiality (Regulation FD exemption).
Publication. Ratings public; methodologies disclosed by regulation after 2010.
Milestones
| Year | Kind | Event | Strength | Harm | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1909 | voluntary assurance | Moody's publishes the first bond ratings, sold to investors by subscription. | source | ||
| 1970 | delegation | Issuer-pays model makes the rated party the client. | source | ||
| 1970 | trigger | Penn Central default; agencies begin charging issuers rather than investors. | financial_loss: Largest US bankruptcy to date | source | |
| 1975 | accreditation | SEC creates the NRSRO designation, embedding ratings in regulation. | 2 | source | |
| 2006 | accreditation | Credit Rating Agency Reform Act formalizes NRSRO registration and SEC oversight. | 3 | source | |
| 2008 | trigger | Structured-finance ratings fail in the financial crisis. | financial_loss: Systemic losses far above $1B | source | |
| 2010 | independence rule | Dodd-Frank Title IX: SEC Office of Credit Ratings, methodology disclosure, analyst separation from sales, expanded liability exposure. | 3 | source |
seed; secondary sources; verify each milestone against a primary source before citing in the paper Data: data/industries/credit-ratings.json