The 30 countries in the European economic area account for less than one out of every five credit ratings issued by credit rating agencies across the world, according to a new report published on Tuesday by the European Securities and Markets Authority, Esma.
Esma said that it found that a total of 141,600 credit ratings have been issued on instruments and issuers in the EEA30 countries at the end of 2022. That represented 17 per cent of the 823,400 ratings issued globally. The bulk of these - 69 per cent - were most for US-issued debt or issuers.
The latest Esma report is the first time ever that the EU financial markets regulator presented a cross-market view on credit ratings. Esma, as well as national financial supervisors in the Esma network, have looked at credit rating agencies with some concern over the course of the last decade, especially given their role during the 2008 financial crisis.
“Credit ratings play a key role in EU financial markets by adding transparency on credit quality and facilitating risk management,” said Esma chair Verana Ros in a statement accompanying the report. “This report – the first on credit ratings – presents a comprehensive overview of the market using the global credit ratings data reported to ESMA as the EU’s CRA supervisor.”
Most are corporate ratings
Esma said that out of the 141,060 credit ratings for European instruments and issuers, most - 79 per cent - were corporate ratings, followed by sovereigns (12 percent) and structured finance (9 per cent).
More than 90 per cent of the ratings for EEA30 debt and issuers had long-term horizons of one year or more. Some 70 per cent were ratings for instruments rather than issuers. The largest three agencies had issued some 69 per cent of all outstanding ratings, including almost all ratings for debt issuers.
The COVID-19 pandemic was the most visible driver of events over the reporting period, said Esma. “Early in 2020 there was a marked increase in rating downgrades across asset classes, particularly for non-financial corporates and commercial mortgage-backed securities. These reflected the pressures faced in certain business sectors from the lockdowns and the associated economic uncertainties.”
Impact of Ukraine invasion less pronounced than pandemic
In contrast, in late 2020 and in 2021 there was an improvement in credit risk indicators across asset classes, as government business support measures were introduced and took effect. In 2022, there were also the negative effects on credit quality of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and tightening monetary policy, though impacts here were much less pronounced and widespread than those of the pandemic, said Esma.
The EU credit rating market report is based on data collected under Credit Rating Agency Regulation and provides an overview of credit rating markets in the EU, as well as risk indicators and metrics for ongoing risk monitoring related to credit ratings. Esma underlined that its analysis is separate from the supervisory work that it conducts on credit rating agencies and that it does not present indicators at an individual CRA level.
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