Internet Case—Municipal Credit Analysis For the fiscal year 2007, the City and County of Denver, Colorado, had approximately $4.9 billion in bonded debt. You are a senior accountant in the controller’s office of the City and County of Denver and have been asked to make a presentation at the next council meeting about how the bond rating agencies use information from the comprehensive annual financial report (CAFR) to determine the city’s bond ratings.
Required
a. What is the bond rating assigned to the City and County of Denver by each of the three major bond rating agencies—Standard and Poor’s, Fitch, and Moody’s?
b. Determine if the ratings assigned to the City and County of Denver by the rating agencies are high, average, or low by referring to the Web sites of each of the rating agencies.
c. What information from the CAFR would the rating agencies have used in assigning a bond rating to the City and County of Denver? What other information might the rating agencies find useful?