At the end of the section of the Financial Services Inquiry interim report dealing with the domestic corporate bond market, the FSI asks, among other things, what is the capacity to develop alternative credit ratings in Australia? Can new standards of creditworthiness be developed?These questions are posed in the context of problems with the use of credit ratings in the corporate bond market, as set out in the review. But they can equally be asked in the context of other issues raised throughout the report, many which are concerned with information asymmetry in one form or another - that is, the difference in what is known by potential lenders and known by a borrower about the perceived risk of that borrower.Small to medium size enterprises have problems accessing funding due to information asymmetry. As any small cap company well knows,  raising equity is difficult and expensive and banks charge more to lend because of perceptions of greater risk and because, as research has shown, they can do so under conditions of information asymmetry. Retail investors, in particular, must also deal with information asymmetry as mandatory disclosure, intended to safeguard their interests, has failed to deliver. The FSI observed that disclosure through lengthy product disclosure statements and other documents is insufficient to deal with the knowledge gap between "buyer and seller".Information asymmetry can make financial markets illiquid. It is very difficult to price risk and therefore financial assets, when the unknowns are too great. In looking at how to direct more funds to infrastructure development, the FSI asks whether liquid, tradable claims on infrastructure projects can be developed. A significant impediment to the funding of infrastructure is how long it takes such projects to even get to the point of becoming income producing. Institutional managers of superannuation funds struggle with this aspect of infrastructure funding. While they seem to be the logical investors in such projects, they must deal with the often unpredictable requirements of the beneficial owners of their funds, who can change investment strategies and even superannuation funds, on a whim.With SMSFs now controlling one-third of all superannuation assets, any means of developing tradable claims on infrastructure projects could make them more likely investors. But information asymmetry problems would be greater for SMSFs than for institutional managers of superannuation funds, and therefore must be addressed. Credit ratings resolve information asymmetry in bond markets and in debt markets overall.Research has shown that having a credit rating will lower the cost of debt not just for bond issuers but for borrowers that rely on bank funding, too.Credit ratings convey the creditworthiness of a borrower to all potential lenders. Individual lenders do not face differing degrees of information asymmetry and a competitive market for a borrower's debt is facilitated. Can alternative credit ratings be developed in Australia? Yes.Can new standards of creditworthiness be developed? No.The definition of creditworthiness cannot change. A borrower either has adequate capacity to service its debt obligations or it doesn't. If it doesn't there is a high risk