The ownership of ratings
研究评级机构与企业之间的最优合同，发现当企业事前不确定自身质量且雇佣决策不可观察时，隐藏评级可能成为均衡结果，而竞争性评级市场反而会减少信息量。
We identify the optimal contract between a rating agency and a firm and the circumstances under which simple ownership contracts implement this optimal solution. We assume that the decision to obtain a rating is endogenous and the price of a rating is a strategic variable. Clients hiding their ratings can be an equilibrium only if they are ex ante uncertain of their quality and if the hiring decision is not observable. For some distribution functions, a competitive rating market is necessary for this result to obtain. In this context, competition between rating intermediaries will lead to less information in equilibrium.