ARTICLES RELATING TO
RATINGS AGENCIES
The Budget Speech was like a snapshot of a car on a hill with its handbrake off - seemingly still, yet at great risk, writes Peter Attard Montalto.
While the Budget Speech does not justify further credit rating cuts, it also will not allay the concerns of ratings agencies sufficiently, an analyst warns.
Legislators have approved new laws to regulate credit ratings companies, and to ensure that they become more accountable and transparent.
Rating agency Standard & Poor's has downgraded the outlook on Standard Bank and FirstRand to negative.
Rating agency Standard & Poor's says it has revised SA's outlook to negative, causing the rand to weaken.
Rating agencies use the debt crisis to tar everyone with the same brush and do not credit SA enough for its economic management, says the finance minister.
Rating agency Moody's says it may cut the credit ratings of 17 global and 114 European financial institutions with exposure to the eurozone debt crisis.
A senior director of ratings agency Fitch says it could revise Italy's rating by two notches.
Global leaders and businessmen say the EU must take fresh steps to resolve its debt crisis, as an IMF executive warns of a "downward spiral" in confidence.
The National Treasury says it remains committed to prudent policies after Fitch revised SA's outlook from stable to negative.
Ratings agency Standard & Poor's was expected to downgrade several eurozone countries except Germany, after the markets closed, sources told Reuters.
Ratings agency Fitch has revised SA's outlook to negative, saying the government had made limited progress on key economic issues.
A senior source in a eurozone government has told Reuters that ratings agency Standard & Poor's is to downgrade several eurozone countries, but not Germany.
The euro stayed near a 16-month low and global stocks fall after ratings agency Fitch warned that a “cataclysmic” collapse of the euro is possible.
Standard & Poor's and Fitch say the death of North Korean dicator Kim Jong-il is unlikely to affect South Korea's A rating.
