The European Commission confirmed, on 18 November, that it had sent a statement of objections to the American rating agency Standard and Poor’s (S&P), singling out the abuse of its dominant position on International Securities Identification Numbers (ISINs), used to identify securities. These codes, used at international level, are attributed in each country by a national agency. In the United States, it is S&P which is responsible for this, and the Commission considers that it is abusing its dominant position, an infringement of Article 82 of the EC Treaty, by requiring financial institutions and information service providers to pay licensing fees for the use of ISINs in their own databases. S&P has eight weeks to reply.