Learn More About the MARQ™ score
A business credit score by Moody's Analytics that helps you and others – like your lenders and suppliers – understand how likely your business is to repay its credit.
What is a MARQ score?
A MARQ (Moody’s Analytics Risk Quality) score is a business credit score that helps you and others – like your lenders and suppliers – understand how likely your business is to repay its credit. It is based on a statistical analysis of the business’s financial information, including measures that indicate if the business is generating enough cash to make its debt payments and if the business is building net worth over time. The MARQ score also considers the industry your business is in and external economic factors. To learn more about the MARQ score and how lenders evaluate creditworthiness, download the MARQ paper.
What is my MARQ score based on?
Your MARQ score is based on the financial information for your business that you submitted to the MARQ site. It is calculated based on up to 11 financial statement ratios derived from 20 inputs from your current and prior year financial statements. The more complete the financial information you provide on your business, the more predictive your score is likely to be. The ratios are used to evaluate the potential creditworthiness of your business based on historical information on whether or not private businesses with similar characteristics have successfully repaid their debts in the past. The historical information comes from the Credit Research Database of Moody’s Analytics, which has been collected in partnership with more than 75 global financial institutions and represents financial information on more than 17 million private companies around the world.
The score also takes into account information about economic conditions and how that might affect your ability to pay back your business’s debt. The economic factors are updated monthly, so it’s possible that your score could change even if you haven’t updated your financial information. This may happen because external economic factors affect your business and can influence your ability to make interest payments on your company’s credit.
How does knowing my MARQ score help me?
Understanding the financial position of your business is essential for success. If you are thinking about applying for a business loan or line of credit, the MARQ score will give you a view of how your lender will evaluate your financial information – it is based on the same models that many banks use to manage their risk. It will give you information on where you’re doing well and where you could improve, so you know where you stand before you apply. Knowing your MARQ score helps put your business in the best position to get the funding you need to grow and prosper. Learn more about how lenders evaluate creditworthiness.
Even if you’re not in the market for a loan, understanding the financial drivers of your business can help you make improvements to strengthen your business and be more profitable and successful. Seeing how you compare to similar businesses will help you target ways to improve your performance.
How do I interpret my MARQ score?
The median MARQ score across businesses in the Moody’s Analytics Credit Research Database is 76. A MARQ score above 83 puts you in the top quartile of businesses, which means your business is in the top 25% in terms of its likelihood of paying back its credit when compared to other private companies. MARQ scores below the median may indicate a higher level of credit risk.
MARQ scores vary by industry, because some types of business are inherently riskier than others. The meter showing your MARQ score also shows the median score for businesses in your industry and region to give you a sense of how you compare.
Does checking my MARQ score affect my credit score?
No, checking or updating your MARQ score does not affect your credit score or your financial position. Your MARQ score is based on the financial information you provide from your linked accounting system. It also considers the industry of your business and external economic factors. The MARQ score does not consider credit inquiries on your business and it is not reported to any external credit bureaus. The score is provided to you as a resource to better understand the financial and credit position of your business, and you are in control of how it is used.
How is MARQ score different from other business credit scores?
The MARQ score is based on the financial information you provide about your business on the MARQ site. It does not consider your personal (non-business) financial position or payment information reported to credit bureaus. Our research has shown that financial information about a business is the best predictor of the longer term probability that a business will pay off its credit, so that is the information we use to provide the score.
Is the MARQ score the same as a Moody’s credit rating?
No. Moody’s credit ratings are produced by Moody’s Investors Service, Inc., a separate entity. They are not connected to a MARQ score.
The MARQ score is a numeric indicator provided by Moody’s Analytics based on a model that statistically analyzes the financial data of private companies to estimate the probability of default on credit.
Learn More About Moody's Analytics
About Moody's Analytics
Moody’s Analytics, a unit of Moody’s Corporation, helps organizations manage credit risk by providing software, analysis, research, and training. Banks and other financial institutions use our models and expertise when making lending decisions and monitoring the loans they’ve made to their customers. Learn more about Moody's Analytics.
A Leader in Quantitative Credit Analysis
Moody’s Analytics provides the models of choice for the world’s leading financial institutions. The predictive power of the models is based on the Credit Research Database (CRDTM), the world’s largest private firm data consortium. The CRD contains over 35 years of historical financial statements for companies in the United States. Moody’s Analytics and the companies from which it was formed pioneered the science of predicting the likelihood of credit default based on the proprietary CRD data and dramatically changed the way credit risk was measured.
The MARQTM (Moody’s Analytics Risk Quality) score applies this expertise, making it available directly to businesses that are seeking credit from lenders or other businesses. The MARQ score is a business credit score that helps small businesses and others – like lenders and suppliers – understand how likely a business is to repay its credit, based on its financial information.
Awards
Leading publications and organizations have recognized Moody’s Analytics’ expertise and experience across credit analysis, economic research and financial risk management, including:
RISK AWARDS 2018: TECHNOLOGY VENDOR OF THE YEAR
FINTECH 100 2017: RANKED 19TH IN OVERALL RANKINGS
CHARTIS RISKTECH100® 2018: VOTED 5TH IN OVERALL RANKINGS AND WINNER IN CREDIT RISK CATEGORY
Learn more about our awards.