Faced with a deadline it was unable to meet, the Securities and Exchange Commission this week published interpretive guidance regarding references in federal regulations to MBS ratings. The Dodd-Frank Act mandated that such references be changed by July 20, but the SEC’s guidance will keep the references intact until the agency and others can establish new standards of creditworthiness. The DFA strikes references to credit ratings from nationally recognized statistical rating organizations in federal regulations and inserts new text that provides that in order to satisfy these definitions a security must meet standards of credit-worthiness established by the SEC. The SEC said it was unable...