Federal prosecutors probe how a tiny ratings firm helped fuel Dodgers owner Mark Walter’s empire

As billionaire Mark Walter’s insurance companies invested in bonds, they often relied on Egan-Jones, which provided the only known ratings for more than a fifth of those assets, according to industry records.

When federal investigators set out to examine how billions of dollars of that financing ended up supporting Walter’s other businesses, they too solicited insights from the small but prolific credit rater.

The Justice Department has gathered records of Egan-Jones Ratings Co.’s work with at least two insurers Walter controls, Delaware Life Insurance Co. and Clear Spring Life and Annuity Co., according to people with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be identified discussing the sensitive inquiries. That includes sending a subpoena to Egan-Jones, according to one of the people. A subpoena doesn’t mean the recipient is currently the focus of a probe and is often required to collect information from firms that have promised confidentiality to clients.

The demands show that the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York is looking outside Walter’s TWG Global holding company and businesses to figure out how those two insurers didn’t disclose — until this year — that more than $20 billion of loans on their books funded affiliated entities.

“We cannot comment on specific matters but we occasionally receive subpoenas in the ordinary course and comply with legal requirements,” Egan-Jones said in a statement. “We are not the subject or target of any investigation at the SDNY.”

Representatives for the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan and TWG Global declined to comment. A spokesperson for Walter’s insurers offered no immediate comment.

Walter, who owns the Los Angeles Dodgers and also runs Guggenheim Partners, amassed much of his personal fortune while helping lead Wall Street’s conquest of insurers. Across the industry, money managers have taken control of carriers and used policyholder funds to seek higher returns by betting on sometimes opaque and illiquid private credit investments. That’s moved many insurers far beyond their traditional turf of staid bonds as they shepherd the retirement funds of millions of everyday Americans.

An investment-grade rating from a firm such as Egan-Jones — which is registered as a Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organization with the Securities and Exchange Commission — can help lower the amount of capital that insurers must hold in case the assets sour, allowing them to run their businesses more efficiently.

The firm rated more than 3,200 investments in 2025 with a team of roughly 25 analysts, growing from a year earlier.

Few insurers rely as heavily on Egan-Jones as Walter’s have.

At the end of last year, the firm was the lone provider of ratings on about 16% of the $32 billion of bonds in Delaware Life’s portfolio, according to a Bloomberg review of data on U.S. insurance holdings and ratings histories. The firm has said it also provides unsolicited ratings for some public securities rated by other firms.

At the much smaller Clear Spring insurer, at least 50% of its $6.3-billion bond book was exclusively rated by Egan-Jones, the data show.

Delaware Life and Clear Spring are among the only four U.S. life insurers that had more than 15% of their bond portfolio rated by Egan-Jones, the industry data show.

Together, the two insurers have paid $8 million to Egan-Jones since 2024, the Financial Times reported previously, citing regulatory filings.

The federal investigation of Walter’s insurers revolves around whether they failed to properly characterize some of their private credit investments as involving related parties. While industry rules allow insurers to lend money to such parties, they require that the dealings be disclosed. Regulators then scrutinize those arrangements to ensure that a firm’s owners don’t put their interests ahead of policyholders.

Delaware Life and Clear Spring said in June that more than $20 billion of loans should have been described as affiliated transactions because of their association with Walter or his other businesses. They made the determination after federal prosecutors in Manhattan sent a subpoena to them in February asking about the transactions, prompting an internal investigation.

Brown, Li, Benny-Morrison and Rajbhandari write for Bloomberg.