credit rating

American  

noun

1. a classification of credit risk based on investigation of a customer's or potential customer's financial resources, prior payment pattern, and personal history or degree of personal responsibility for debts incurred.

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credit rating British  

noun

1. an evaluation of the creditworthiness of an individual or business enterprise

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credit rating Cultural  

1. An evaluation of the financial trustworthiness of an individual, firm, or government.

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Etymology

Origin of credit rating

First recorded in 1955–60

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

credit rating

The third investigation followed the downgrading of South East Water's credit rating by Moody's in May, which meant the firm was in breach of its licence condition.

From BBC ● Jul. 14, 2026

S&P Global issued a report last week that assigned SpaceX a “BBB” credit rating, the lowest possible rating to qualify as an investment grade credit risk.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 23, 2026

On Thursday, the company received a “BBB” credit rating from S&P Global Ratings.

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 20, 2026

“You wouldn’t want a credit rating agency to say, ‘Well, you’re not going to sell it, and so therefore I’m going to mark it to zero in my credit assessment.’”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 1, 2026

Nina Chandler Murray, an eighty-five-year-old relative of the Poor family of Standard & Poor’s, the investment credit rating firm, is convinced that the world of the elite was more genteel in the old days.

From "Class Matters" by The New York Times