Credit rating agency

A credit rating agency is a company or an institution charged with the Notation of the communities (States…) or of the companies according to certain criteria defined by a regulation or the actors of market.

An credit rating agency can note according to financial criteria but also, more and more, according to ecological criteria, social or moral.

Historically, the first credit rating agencies are the credit rating agencies financial such as Fitch Ratings, Moody' S and Standard & Poor' S. These agencies operate, subject to remuneration, at the request of the companies (and possibly of the communities) wishing to be noted, but in all independence compared to those.

Nevertheless, of many financial institutions their own service of notation of the companies and communities have, with the example of the Coface for example.

Credit rating agency and social responsibility of the companies

One saw appearing, in the field of the Sustainable development, of the agencies noting the companies according to social and environmental criteria. These agencies determine starting from various criteria the level of responsibility for the company, the Social responsibility of the companies compared to sustainable development.

At the beginning, the credit rating agencies thus specialized primarily worked for the investors of the field of the socially responsible investment (ISR).

In full expansion, this sector includes/understands about thirty exclusive structures, of which most important are in Europe: Oekom in Germany, Triodos in the Netherlands, Avanzi in Italy, BMJ Ratings and Vigeo in France.

The stake took importance in France with the creation of the Reserve funds for the Retirements (FRR) whose criteria of management included a priori an obligation to integrate credits managed according to criteria of social and environmental notation. Analyzes on the coherence of these criteria and their relevance taking into consideration criterion of Sustainable development, such as statements in the Agenda 21 were led to this end (see external bonds).

It should be noted that the company Vigeo whose large French groups are shareholders, is prone to a certain polemic when with the inclusion of companies like Total in their ethical investment trust.

The territorial collectivities are the subject from now on also of procedures of financial extra notation, which develop in France of the companies like BMJ Ratings, which intervenes also in parallel in the notation of private companies, and ARCET Notation , which is specialized exclusively in the evaluation and the notation of the public entities.

In France, the Observatoire on the responsibility sociétale for the companies (ORSE) publishes a guide of these credit rating agencies with their methodology.

See too

External bonds

Dittrich, Fabian (2007) " The Credit Industry Rating: Competition and Regulation" (English)
How to measure the durable performance of the companies? Proposal of a grid of indicators, study carried out in 2002.
To invest in sustainable development, [[Gregoire Postel-Vinay] and Renaud Access of Châtillon 2003]
comparative Analysis of indicator of sustainable development, study carried out by the ORSE for the Observatory of the Industrial strategies - MinEFI
reserve funds for the retirements in France
Article on the notation of sustainable development
Novethic: article on the credit rating agencies
Observatory on the responsibility sociétale for the companies
note on the funds ethics 2001, Ministry for the Economy of Finances and Industry
total reporting initiative
BMJ Ratings, credit rating agency extra financial

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