The four major players in the market for credit rating analysis: Standard And Poors, Fitch Ratings, Moody's Investors Service and the Dominion Bond Rating Service face a toughening of the regulatory regime. The four agencies are the only ones with the designation of "nationally recognised statistical ratings organisations." Currently they have to suffer a light touch by regulators.

Of course the agencies dislike the changes. They prefer the opaque statements without any recourse to show how they arrive at their decisions.

A long running Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) review is likely to increase the reporting and recording requirements. The process of recognition however is unlikely to change though. The aim of the change is to enable the SEC to examine how the agencies assess creditworthiness.

The general tightening of regulatory controls follows the Enron collapse. The agencies had days before given Enron a clean bill of health. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act 2002 tightened the screw on companies. Now the agencies which judge companies will be squeezed.

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