S&P Global

S&P Global benefits from multiple, mutually reinforcing moats. In Ratings, the NRSRO regime, decades of performance, and issuer and investor reliance create formidable regulatory and reputational barriers.

In Indices, the S&P 500 and related benchmarks confer brand and network effects that translate into asset-linked fees and long-term licensing contracts embeddeding the firm in trillions of passive and structured assets.

Market Intelligence and Commodity Insights enjoy high switching costs as data, analytics, and workflows become mission-critical and integrated into clients’ systems. Efficient scale and global distribution lower unit costs over time.

Moat erosion risks include regulatory actions against rating agencies, fee pressures in indices or data, disintermediation by alternative data or AI, and custom or direct indexing encroachment.

The 2024 10-K outlines the regulatory backdrop and recent compliance settlements, while quarterly disclosures show recurring subscription and asset-linked revenue growth supporting durability.