Central Bank of Russia to launch pilot stock rating system for domestic issuers
MOSCOW. March 26 (Interfax) - The Central Bank of Russia plans to launch a pilot project for rating Russian companies' stocks in summer 2025, with the full-scale mechanism expected to become operational in 2026, the head of the Central Bank's Corporate Relations Department Ekaterina Abasheyeva said in an interview with RBC Investments.
"The idea is that rating agencies will act as providers of independent fair value assessments for issuers. These assessments will be based on both financial and non-financial metrics," Abasheyeva said.
Agencies will assign star ratings to stocks accompanied by detailed analytics, she said. This will provide investors with transparent, professional benchmarks to inform their investment decisions.
"Rating agencies have begun developing methodologies for this new rating category. We plan to pilot the project based on these methodologies," she said.
At least two rating agencies have already developed and presented their methodologies to issuers and professional analysts, she said. While based on modeled fair value of issuers, the methodologies also consider other factors such as corporate governance quality, investor protection and sanction-sensitive issuer information. The Central Bank does not intend to impose strict methodology requirements during the pilot phase.
The system will allow issuers to receive multiple ratings from different agencies. Significant discrepancies between agency assessments may prompt the Central Bank to consider establishing minimum requirements for analysts.
The regulator proposes that ratings be updated approximately every six months, aligning their publication with reporting periods to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS).
The stock rating system will serve as Russia's counterpart to Morningstar's project, which offers similar rating products in North America, Europe and Asia. Morningstar, a U.S.-based investment research company and rating agency, employs its own star rating system.
The Central Bank anticipates making stock ratings mandatory for issuers who limit disclosures due to sanction risks. "The rating should indirectly communicate information about companies that cannot disclose it themselves due to sanctions. However, this won't be implemented at launch, but rather when the product proves operational," Abasheyeva said.
Russian companies have been permitted to not fully disclose information about their activities since March 2022. In spring 2024, the Central Bank announced plans to label the securities of insufficiently transparent companies, originally hoping to implement these rules by the end of that year. However, in early 2025 it emerged that complications had arisen with the document's registration at the Justice Ministry. Central Bank First Deputy Governor Vladimir Chistyukhin acknowledged debates about the regulator's authority to implement the labeling initiative.
