The Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny of Trinidad and To­ba­go Lim­it­ed (NGC) is de­fend­ing its de­ci­sion to end its re­la­tion­ship with Moody’s In­vestors Ser­vice, say­ing the move forms part of a strate­gic re­align­ment aimed at se­cur­ing a cred­it rat­ing that bet­ter re­flects the com­pa­ny’s stand­alone fi­nan­cial strength.

The re­sponse comes a day af­ter Moody’s with­drew NGC’s Ba2 cor­po­rate fam­i­ly rat­ing, ba2 base­line cred­it as­sess­ment and Ba2 se­nior un­se­cured notes rat­ing.

Moody’s said the with­draw­al was due to “in­ad­e­quate in­for­ma­tion to mon­i­tor the rat­ings, due to the is­suer’s de­ci­sion to cease par­tic­i­pa­tion in the rat­ing process.”