On January 5, 2015, three Delegated Regulations of Regulatory Technical Standards ("RTS") required under the Credit Ratings Agencies Regulation ("CRA Regulation") were published in the Official Journal of the European Union:

  1. Delegated Regulation for the periodic reporting on fees charged by credit rating agencies for the purpose of ongoing supervision by the European Securities and Markets Authority ("ESMA"). This applies from January 26, 2015.
  2. Delegated Regulation for the presentation of the information that credit rating agencies make available to ESMA. This applies from June 21, 2015.
  3. Delegated Regulation on disclosure requirements for structured finance instruments. This applies from January 1, 2017.

The objectives of the CRA Regulation include strengthening the existing EU legislation on credit rating agencies, reducing financial institution reliance on external credit ratings and improving competition in the credit ratings industry.

The regulations are available at: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=OJ:JOL_2015_002_R_0001&from=EN; http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=OJ:JOL_2015_002_R_0002&from=EN; and http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=OJ:JOL_2015_002_R_0003&from=EN.

The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.