What this page is
Every published Grade on Top1031 is a letter derived from two counts on public documents: programs that lost investor capital and programs whose results the sponsor published. This page records every version of the method behind those letters, dated, with what changed and why, so a letter can always be read against the rules that were in force when it was published. Each sponsor's page shows only its current Grade; no sponsor has any role in what appears here.
Method version 2
Effective September 4, 2026. The Grade method moved from version 1.7 to version 2, the record card. In plain words, this is what changed.
- Two counts instead of four weighted channels. Version 1.7 blended four scored channels into a number and mapped the number to a letter. Version 2 uses two counts: programs that lost investor capital, and programs the sponsor sold and reported a result for. A short list of rules, read in order, turns those counts into a letter.
- Losses only from court, county or sponsor-published records. A loss now counts only when a foreclosure, receivership, bankruptcy filing, loan default or the sponsor's own published figure shows it. News reports and lawsuits are printed on the sponsor's page but do not move the letter.
- No proof depth, signatures, rank or hysteresis. The evidence-depth number, the short descriptive phrases, the within-band rank and the two-run publication delay are all retired. A letter changes when a count changes, and the change is dated with its document.
- Every count links to documents. Each line on a sponsor's record card links to the programs it was counted from, and each program links to the document that put it there.
- Why many sponsors are Not rated. Under version 2 a sponsor is Not rated when fewer than three of its programs have a counted outcome; that is most sponsors on the register today. Their record cards still show every program, every sale and any loss we found. Letters also moved because losses that rested on news reports no longer count, and losses printed in a sponsor's own performance table now do. Earlier letters are not shown; each sponsor's page carries only its current Grade. The full method, with the rules and thresholds, is on the methodology page. The previous method remains documented in the repository for the record.
On September 4, 2026, every rated sponsor's card was published under this method.