Key EU lawmaker urges rating agency registration

By Huw Jones

BRUSSELS, June 24 (Reuters) - Credit rating agencies should be made to register to operate in the European Union and be supervised by a pan-EU committee of national watchdogs, a senior EU lawmaker said on Tuesday.

Pervenche Beres, chair of the European Parliament's influential economics committee, said agencies should have to register as they do in the United States and thereby come under a financial supervisor that is accountable.

The Committee of European Securities Regulators (CESR), made up of national market watchdogs from the 27 EU states, should be the registration body that also coordinates overall supervision of the sector, Beres said.

"The best solution would be that CESR is the place where the rating agencies should be registered," she told Reuters.

"Supervision should be under CESR. If you have national supervisors doing their own supervision without doing any coordinated approach, you will be creating a non-level playing field," Beres said.

Such clear backing from the parliament is likely to be welcomed by EU Internal Market Commissioner Charlie McCreevy. He is finalising proposals for beefing up oversight of credit rating agencies, a sector dominated by Standard & Poor's (MHP.N), Moody's (MCO.N) and Fitch (LBCP.PA).

McCreevy has said a voluntary industry code for agencies is a "toothless wonder" that failed to "sniff out the rot" in U.S. mortgage-backed structured products that became untradeable during the subprime crisis despite their high credit ratings.

Parliament and EU states have the final say on McCreevy's proposal, which he will outline to the bloc's finance ministers next month.