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Credit rating and competition

Author

Listed:
  • Camanho-Da-Costa-Neto, Nelson
  • Deb, Pragyan
  • Liu, Zijun

Abstract

In principle, credit rating agencies are supposed to be impartial observers that bridge the gap between private information of issuers and the information available to the wider pool of investors. However, since the 1970s, rating agencies have relied on an issuer-pay model, creating a conflict of interest - the largest source of income for the rating agencies are the fees paid by the issuers the rating agencies are supposed to impartially rate. In this paper, we explore the trade-off between reputation and fees and find that relative to monopoly, rating agencies are more prone to inflate ratings under competition, resulting in lower expected welfare. Our results suggest that more competition by itself is undesirable under the current issuer-pay model and will do little to resolve the conflict of interest problem.

Suggested Citation

  • Camanho-Da-Costa-Neto, Nelson & Deb, Pragyan & Liu, Zijun, 2010. "Credit rating and competition," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 119087, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
  • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:119087
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    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/119087/
    File Function: Open access version.
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Skreta, Vasiliki & Veldkamp, Laura, 2009. "Ratings shopping and asset complexity: A theory of ratings inflation," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(5), pages 678-695, July.
    2. Mathis, Jérôme & McAndrews, James & Rochet, Jean-Charles, 2009. "Rating the raters: Are reputation concerns powerful enough to discipline rating agencies?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(5), pages 657-674, July.
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    Cited by:

    1. Xiangyun Zhou, 2021. "Can the dual-rating regulation improve the rating quality of Chinese corporate bonds?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(12), pages 1-15, December.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    rating agency; conflicts of interest; competition; reputation; repeated games; financial regulation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C73 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Stochastic and Dynamic Games; Evolutionary Games
    • D43 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Oligopoly and Other Forms of Market Imperfection
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
    • G24 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Investment Banking; Venture Capital; Brokerage

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