Nordic Credit Rating (NCR) has published proposed revisions to its Corporate Rating Methodology. The document has been updated throughout to improve clarity and conform with current regulations. A major change is the introduction of a matrix combining business and financial risks that will put more emphasis to for example a high financial risk as well added transparency and granularity to scoring of financial ratios and treatment of liquidity.
We are requesting comments on the proposed amendments and encourage interested parties to provide direct feedback at criteria@nordiccreditrating.com by 7 Nov. 2025. We will review all comments received, with the intention of publishing an anonymised summary of responses and the final methodology once complete.
Summary of amendments
The proposed revisions entail:
- framework changed to a matrix combining business and financial risk assessments from earlier 50/50 weight to arrive at indicative credit assessment;
- combining the market position and size & diversification subfactors for corporates into one subfactor;
- added granularity for scoring of financial ratios in 'bb+' to 'b-' levels;
- introduced two additional supplementary financial ratios for corporates and one additional for real estate companies;
- a more differentiated treatment of liquidity, adding notching alternatives for either very strong or very weak liquidity management;
- moved the section describing business risk and financial ratios scores for real estate management companies to Appendix. Appendix allows for adding guidelines for specific industries;
- adding an appendix to explain the impact of environmental, social, and governance factors on our assessment of corporates; and
- updating text and guidelines throughout the methodology, with the intention of removing outdated references, simplifying text, and improving readability and transparency.
The proposed changes would require corresponding adjustments to our Investment Holding Company Rating Methodology, reflecting the change to a matrix combining business and financial risk assessments.
Impact on published ratings
The revisions are not intended to reflect a change in underlying risk drivers. However, they will result in all issuer ratings on corporates being placed under criteria review. We do not expect the proposed changes to have a major impact on our existing issuer ratings but acknowledge that a small number could be affected. The criteria review will occur once the proposed methodology is finalised. All ratings affected will be reviewed as soon as possible and no later than six months after publication of the amended methodology.
Contacts:
Elisabeth Adebäck, analyst, +46700442775, elisabeth.adeback@nordiccreditrating.com
Gustav Nilsson, analyst, +46735420446, gustav.nilsson@nordiccreditrating.com