Nature of Operations and Basis of Presentation

6 Months Ended

Jun. 30, 2015

Organization, Consolidation and Presentation of Financial Statements [Abstract]

Nature of Operations and Basis of Presentation

McGraw Hill Financial, Inc. (together with its consolidated subsidiaries, "McGraw Hill Financial," the “Company,” “we,” “us” or “our”) is a leading benchmarks & ratings, analytics, data and research provider serving the global capital, commodities and commercial markets. The capital markets include asset managers, investment banks, commercial banks, exchanges, and issuers; the commodities markets include producers, traders and intermediaries within energy, metals, and agriculture; and the commercial markets include professionals and corporate executives within automotive and marketing / research information services.

Our operations consist of four reportable segments: Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services (“S&P Ratings”), S&P Capital IQ, S&P Dow Jones Indices ("S&P DJ Indices") and Commodities & Commercial Markets (“C&C”).


•	S&P Ratings is an independent provider of credit ratings, research and analytics, offering investors and market participants information, ratings and benchmarks.


•	S&P Capital IQ is a global provider of multi-asset-class data, research and analytical capabilities, which integrate cross-asset analytics and desktop services.


•	S&P DJ Indices is a global index provider that maintains a wide variety of valuation and index benchmarks for investment advisors, wealth managers and institutional investors.


•	C&C consists of business-to-business companies specializing in commercial and commodities markets that deliver their customers access to high-value information, data, analytic services and pricing and quality benchmarks.

The accompanying unaudited financial statements of the Company have been prepared in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America (“U.S. GAAP”) for interim financial information and with the instructions to Form 10-Q and Article 10 of Regulation S-X. Accordingly, they do not include all of the information and footnotes required by U.S. GAAP for complete financial statements. Therefore, the financial statements included herein should be read in conjunction with the financial statements and notes included in our Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2014 (our “Form 10-K”).

In the opinion of management all normal recurring adjustments considered necessary for a fair statement of the results of the interim periods have been included. The operating results for the three and six months ended June 30, 2015 are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be expected for the full year. Certain prior-year amounts have been reclassified to conform to the current presentation.

Our critical accounting estimates are disclosed in Item 7, Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations, in our Form 10-K. On an ongoing basis, we evaluate our estimates and assumptions, including those related to revenue recognition, allowance for doubtful accounts, valuation of long-lived assets, goodwill and other intangible assets, pension plans, incentive compensation and stock-based compensation, income taxes, contingencies and redeemable noncontrolling interests. Since the date of our Form 10-K, there have been no material changes to our critical accounting policies and estimates.