As an adjunct to his efforts, Guan established institutional collaboration with Japanese and South Korean domestic credit ratings agencies, including China-Japan-Korea credit rating forums held in Beijing and Tokyo.

All this has shaped many of Guan's views on the way financial markets work, and helped him to develop the Dagong Credit Rating Methodology, said to be the first rating methodology focused on intellectual property rights incorporating international standards and adapting the methodology to conditions in China, as well as proposing a plan for the Chinese credit system and a manual for establishing Chinese credit system.

He says the new method of rating infrastructure investment focuses especially on infrastructure projects before or during construction, which is technically very challenging as most of the world's existing credit rating methods can only model risks based on infrastructure already in use.

"To have ratings for these infrastructure deals is very important because the amount of capital to be provided by public funding, through institutions like the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, is very limited, and a reliable credit rating will help attract private sector financing."

Guan says Dagong's emergence onto the global credit rating scene is inseparable from China becoming a crucial driver of global economic recovery.

"China needs a stable international political environment for its rise. Credit relations serve as the economic foundation for modern society, and international credit relations will function as a main incentive for international political and economic reforms.

"A fair, objective and reasonable international credit rating facility can issue an early warning against financial risks and prevent the outbreak of an international financial crisis, which is beneficial to China's stable development."

As Chinese capital is invested abroad, reliable information on credit risks is a precondition for efficient flow of China's capital to the rest of the world. Helping to build a new international credit rating system is consistent with China's peaceful development goals, he says.

In addition, China's status as the world's largest creditor nation has laid a strong foundation for the rebuilding of a new international credit rating system, because it is the creditor rather than the debtor who should make a judgment of credit risks, Guan says.

cecily.liu@mail.chinadailyuk.com