Five brokerage firms began distributing investment research from Standard & Poor’s Tuesday, as part of the global research settlement that was reached with regulators and prosecutors last year.

Citigroup Smith Barney, Credit Suisse First Boston, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Piper Jaffray are all distributing S&P’s equity research, under the terms of the settlement. In addition to direct engagements with these banks, which encompass more than 11 million customer accounts, Standard & Poor’s equity research will also be available to other banks in the settlement through BNY Jaywalk, a research aggregation platform hosted by the Bank of New York.

The rating agency also introduced Tuesday a new version of its flagship equity research offering for retail investors and investment advisors today, on the U.S. stocks covered by its equity research analysts. The new reports include 12-month target prices, recommendations, earnings-per-share estimates, and a redesigned presentation of the data and research.

Through the terms of the agreements with the investment banks, investors will have access to research
from Standard & Poor’s team of 90 U.S., European and Asian equity analysts, who use a fundamental, bottom-up approach to cover a global universe of 1,750 equities across more than 120 industries. It will also provide each investment bank with buy-hold-sell recommendations on stocks covered by each bank’s own equity analysts, as well as data feeds designed to help power the banks’ investor Web sites, client statements, and trade confirmations.

“Standard & Poor’s is delighted to serve these new customers and looks forward to providing them and
their investor clients with the kind of independent and high-quality equity research that we have been
delivering to more than 1,000 institutions and their clients for decades,” says Hendrik Kranenburg,
executive vice president, S&P. “We recognize that the independent consultants had to choose among a field of many different kinds of research providers. Selecting S&P is a recognition of our performance track record, our consistent methodologies, and our long experience serving investors directly.”