S&P Global gets the nod to enter China’s bond rating market
- China’s central bank said that it supports further opening-up of the rating industry and will tighten regulations for credit assessment in China
- No mention of Moody’s Investors Service and Fitch Ratings in PBOC’s announcement
Chinese regulators have allowed S&P Global Ratings’ Beijing-based wholly owned unit to conduct credit rating business on the mainland, according to a statement from the People’s Bank of China.
The credit assessor is now allowed to register for bond rating service in China’s interbank market.
The PBOC did not mention Moody’s Investors Service and Fitch Ratings in its announcement on Monday.
The introduction of international rating firms will meet foreign investors’ demand for various yuan-denominated assets and improve credit rating quality in the domestic market, the central bank said in the statement.
For two decades China had restricted foreign rating agencies to partner with Chinese firms.
The PBOC said that it supports further opening-up of the rating industry and will tighten regulations for credit assessment in China.
“We are honoured to establish the first credit rating agency wholly owned by an international investor in China to serve its domestic bond markets,” said Douglas L Peterson, S&P Global president and CEO. “This announcement reinforces our belief that we are uniquely placed to meet the substantial demand from Chinese issuers and investors for transparent, globally understood and reliable credit ratings, data and research.”
John Berisford, president of S&P Global Ratings, said that this approval was the latest step in an ongoing dialogue with China’s regulators about the future they envisage for their financial markets.