During the Sovereign Debt Crisis in Europe in 2010/12, the idea of monitoring the credit rating agencies’ timeliness of ratings came to the fore. Since then, the EU has been pushing for more impactful regulatory endeavours in the credit rating arena, with many missing the mark. Yesterday, the ESMA Chief Steven Maijoor turned his attention to the issue of procyclicality again as the CRAs being to downgrade a number of countries, with a number of others teetering between investment and non-investment grade status. Maijoor started by stating that ‘ the timing of ratings actions needs to be carefully calibrated ’. This is because of the fear that procyclicality will be rearing its head once more, just like it did a decade ago. The concept of procyclicality is described as when credit ratings ‘ are stricter during an economic downturn than in an expansion ’. Scholars have discussed how, in good times, the ratings tend to be ‘ inflated ’ but that when the market turns, the ‘massive’ r...