The power of a ratings downgrade - the UK example
A peripheral issue in the Australian election campaign is the danger of a downgrade by those dreaded ratings agencies. Listen to some of the political talk and you would think that the danger of the Australian government losing its triple A status would send us to debtors prison because of higher interest rate. I was intrigued this morning to look at what has happened in the UK since the post-Brexit downgrading of its credit rating. From London's Financial Times : A decline in rates across the range! From memory the same pattern of a government being able to borrow at a cheaper rate following a downgrading occurred in the United States. The power of the ratings agencies indeed.