Controversies

Sovereign downgrades

Moody's, along with the other major credit rating agencies, is often the subject of criticism from countries whose public debt is downgraded, generally claiming increased cost of borrowing as a result of the downgrade.^[30] Examples of sovereign debt downgrades that attracted significant media attention at the time include Australia in the 1980s, Canada and Japan in the 1990s, Thailand during the 1997 Asian financial crisis,^[5] and Portugal in 2011 following the European sovereign debt crisis.^[31]

Unsolicited ratings

Moody's has occasionally faced litigation from entities whose bonds it has rated on an unsolicited basis, and investigations concerning such unsolicited ratings. In October 1995, the school district of Jefferson County, Colorado sued Moody's, claiming the unsolicited assignment of a "negative outlook" to a 1993 bond issue was based on Jefferson County having selected S&P and Fitch to do its rating. Moody's rating raised the issuing cost to Jefferson County by $769,000.^[32] Moody's argued that its assessment was "opinion" and therefore constitutionally protected; the court agreed, and the decision was upheld on appeal.^[12]
In the mid-1990s, the U.S. Justice Department's antitrust division opened an investigation to determine whether unsolicited ratings amounted to an illegal exercise of market power,^[19] however the investigation was closed with no antitrust charges filed. Moody's has pointed out that it has assigned unsolicited ratings since 1909, and that such ratings are the market's "best defense against rating shopping" by issuers. In November 1999, Moody's announced it would begin identifying which ratings were unsolicited as part of a general move toward greater transparency.^[5] The agency faced a similar complaint in the mid-2000s from Hannover Re, a German insurer that lost $175 million in market value when its bonds were lowered to "junk" status.^[3][33][34] In 2005, unsolicited ratings were at the center of a subpoena by the New York Attorney General's office under Eliot Spitzer, but again no charges were filed.^[12]
Following the 2008 financial crisis, the SEC adopted new rules for the rating agency industry, including one to encourage unsolicited ratings. The intent of the rule is to counteract potential conflicts of interest in the issuer-pays model by ensuring a "broader range of views on the creditworthiness" of a security or instrument.^[35][36]

Alleged conflicts of interest

The "issuer pays" business model adopted in the 1970s by Moody's and other rating agencies has been criticized for creating a possible conflict of interest, supposing that rating agencies may artificially boost the rating of a given security in order to please the issuer.^[3] The SEC recently acknowledged, however, in its September 30, 2011 summary report of its mandatory annual examination of NRSROs that the subscriber-pays model under which Moody’s operated prior to adopting the issuer pays model also "presents certain conflicts of interest inherent in the fact that subscribers, on whom the NRSRO relies, have an interest in ratings actions and could exert pressure on the NRSRO for certain outcomes".^[37] Other alleged conflicts of interest, also the subject of a Department of Justice investigation the mid-1990s, raised the question of whether Moody's pressured issuers to use its consulting services upon threat of a lower bond rating.^[38] Moody's has maintained that its reputation in the market is the balancing factor, and a 2003 study, covering 1997 to 2002, suggested that "reputation effects" outweighed conflicts of interest. Thomas McGuire, a former executive vice president, said in 1995 that: "[W]hat’s driving us is primarily the issue of preserving our track record. That’s our bread and butter".^[39]