PhillyDeals: Survey: Bond buyers pick 2 rivals over rosier S&P

They aren't all the same: "Rate-shopping" cities may prefer

Standard & Poor's

rosier credit ratings - but bond buyers trust rivals

Moody's Investors Service

and

Fitch Ratings

more to warn investors when towns are less likely to pay what they owe, says municipal bond analyst Tom Kozlik.

A majority of municipal-bond analysts, 57 percent, said they had a "very favorable" or "somewhat favorable" opinion of both Moody's and Fitch, compared with just 43 percent for S&P, according to a survey of 162 analysts at bond investment funds, brokerages, bond insurers, and other firms conducted by Kozlik, of Janney Montgomery Scott L.L.C. in Philadelphia. The analysts were polled in late March, and the results were announced this week.

Borrowers with high, safe credit ratings can typically raise money from investors at cheaper interest rates than those with lower, riskier ratings.

Bond buyers' preference "isn't surprising," Kozlik told me. He found last year that local-government bond issuers, who pay the agencies to rate them, have been "starting to not use Moody's local government ratings because they were lower than S&P's ratings," especially after S&P upgraded a wave of cities in 2013.

S&P boosted Philadelphia's credit rating twice that year, a move celebrated by Mayor Nutter but not copied by Moody's. S&P has invited skeptics to review its criteria, which it says are appropriate.

The Chicago school district last week dropped Moody's, which was threatening to cut the district's debt to junk-bond status, in favor of a smaller service, Kroll Bond Rating Agency, which rated the schools "stable," the Bond Buyer newspaper reported.

All the credit-rating agencies were widely criticized in the late 2000s after they failed to predict the financial collapse of the home-mortgage finance industry.

Iroko Pharmaceuticals L.L.C., based at the old Philadelphia Navy Base, says it has been awarded U.S. patents for FDA-approved anti-inflammatory drugs Zorvolex (diclofenac) and Tivorbex (indomethacin).

The patents will last at least to 2030, Iroko says. Chairman Osagie Imasogie says his firm will join iCeutica, developer of the SoluMatrix drug-delivery system, in finding new uses and markets for these drugs.

RES Software is growing and needs more office space for its Radnor-based North American operations, says Al Monserrat, the veteran Citrix Systems Inc. executive hired by RES to run the Dutch-owned firm as chief executive, for founder Bob Janssen and investor Updata Partners. Monserrat replaces Klaus Besier, who left last year.

But Monserrat doesn't plan to move north from his Florida home, he told me: "I'll live out of a virtual office, demonstrating the power of the product." And travel a lot.

RES builds software platforms for clients including Intuit, Cigna, and W.R. Berkley Corp. to use VMware- and Citrix-based applications to link workers and secure data. The firm employs 250 worldwide, including 40 in Radnor.

Point.io, a University City firm whose software platform helps customers build cloud-based mobile applications that work with older and desktop systems, has raised $4 million from unnamed "prominent companies and individuals" in New York and Philadelphia, after fund-raising in the local venture-capital community fell short, chief executive Ron Rock tells me.

Rock and his fellow managers acquired Point.io (formerly CloudPointe) from Andrew Schwabe in 2013. Rock says clients include health care, telecom, and financial service companies, served by a mixed team of 30 "brilliant kids" and veteran engineers.

Rock sold his previous firm, Knowledge Rules, a business-process management consultancy, to Accenture in 2010.