I agree with what you say. Additionally, ratings agencies are required to either maintain a rating or withdraw it (i.e they can't just let the current rating go stale) and given the ABS bonds need to be rated throughout their life at least Moodys is essentially forced to keep rating Tesla for at least a few more years.
Given this position I wonder if they are open to a "credibility attack", I.e. if there is enough public discourse dressing down Moodys for an increasingly stupid position whether they would need to move just to fend off criticism or else start losing business on other unrelated transactions. "who cares what Moodys thinks, they still rate Tesla as junk"
there has also been an explosion of new ratings agencies looking to eat the established agencies lunch (e.g Arc, kbra, etc - full list here)
I wouldn't have thought this could be possible but the Tesla retail fan base is also far larger and more powerful than any other I have seen and meme stocks are a thing now. It will be interesting to see how the current public pressure plays out.
