Six commercial-mortgage backed securities Standard & Poor graded in 2011 are under question after McGraw Hill Financial said it received a notice from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that the regulator may seek an enforcement action. Per Bloomberg:
McGraw Hill’s market share for rating bonds backed by commercial mortgages has declined since the firm pulled assigned grades on a $1.5 billion offering in July 2011. New York-based S&P is cutting about a third of its staff in the division, a person with knowledge of the matter said last week.
S&P rated six commercial-mortgage bond deals in 2011, according to a report from Morgan Stanley. They included three that pooled loans from borrowers across the U.S. and three tied to a single borrower, such as a $1 billion transaction linked to retail properties acquired by Blackstone Group LP.
