Credit rating downgrades have menaced western industrial economies since the global financial crisis first erupted almost six years ago. Across much of the rest of the world, the trend is in the opposite direction.
Countries in Latin America and fast-developing regions of Asia top the list of rating upgrades since the start of 2007 compiled by the Financial Times. At the bottom is crisis-hit southern Europe, including Greece, whose creditors last year faced steep losses under the country’s debt restructuring.
The shifts in the global credit ratings map shown by the FT’s analysis highlight how – unlike previous financial crises since the second world war – much of the damage wrought by volatile banking or financial systems and weak public finances has been focused on advanced western economies, especially in Europe.