The Reality of Brexit: Farewell to the UK's last AAA rating

Moritz Kraemer, chief ratings officer for S&P Global Ratings (the new name for Standard & Poor’s), stated today that the UK’s AAA rating was no longer “tenable” under the circumstances and would be downgraded at least one notch “within a short period of time”. While it is unclear what effect this downgrade will have, the only certainty is that it will heap insecurity upon insecurity, adding to the markets’ troubles and further raising the cost of government borrowing.

Other leading CRAs, notably Moody’s and Fitch, had already downgraded the UK prior to the start of the referendum campaign. Moody’s, which currently assigns the UK a rating of AA1, one notch below a AAA score, had previously warned of further downgrades following a vote to leave the EU. Moody’s has also warned that a UK exit of the EU could also see downgrades of UK businesses, impacting on their ability to borrow and, consequently, reducing their ability to invest. The referendum outcome is “credit negative” and could “increase the risk of political fragmentation within the EU if popular support for the bloc fades among member states”.

Fitch had also downgraded the UK prior to the Brexit debate, and has assigned a rating one notch below AAA since 2013. However it has also warned of short-term disruption and long term risks for the UK. In less dramatic language, Fitch Ratings described Brexit as “moderately credit negative” for the UK, and expects knock-on downgrades for UK entities to be relatively limited in the short term.

All three CRAs, while repeating the negative effect of the vote, stress the importance of the deal that Britain can strike with the EU as a principal factor in determining mid to long term ratings, both for the sovereign and entities. 

Diverging Opinions: S&P refuses to follow Moody's, instead reaffirming the UK's AAA

A few weeks ago, Moody's downgraded the UK one notch to AA1, depriving it for the first time of its top AAA rating. It was roughly a month before the Chancellor was due to deliver his budget, and we wondered what Moody's knew that we didn't. Well, maybe not a great deal. In a counter move, Standard & Poor's yesterday announced that it would be maintaining the UK's AAA rating, albeit with a negative outlook and a one in three likelihood of downgrade over the next 18 months. The agency expects the UK economy to grow by 1.6% per year for the next three years - below estimates provided by the Office for Budgetary Responsibility. It also states that any easing of the austerity program may precipitate a downgrade. Fitch Inc has altered the UK's status from "negative outlook" to "negative watch", indicating that a downgrade may yet be imminent, but allowing the UK to cling on to the top rating for a little longer.

So why did the largest two ratings agencies come to different conclusions about the UK economy?

I discussed the downgrade by Moody's in a previous post, and will focus on S&P's decision here. 

S&P's reaffirmed the UK rating because “the Government remains committed to implementing its fiscal programme, and has the ability and willingness to respond rapidly to economic challenges”. This is despite the fact that the national debt as a percentage of GDP in 2016 is expected to rise from 85% to 95% while the deficit falls to only 4.2%. While this clearly remains within the 'acceptable' limits of fiscal consolidation according to S&P's, the agency warned that should the pace slow any further, a downgrade will follow. The top rating was apparently spared on the back of the UK's wealthy and diverse economy, the flexibility of fiscal and monetary policy, as well as flexible and adequate product and labour markets. These were taken into account by Moody's as well though, indicating perhaps that S&P's has placed slightly more weight on the willingness and political commitment of the government to stick to its austerity plans, come rain or shine.

Standard & Poor's also made mention of the EU referendum promised to UK voters by David Cameron. The agency's assumptions are based on the premise that corporate sentiments are unaffected by the uncertainty created by the referendum. In other words the CRA acknowledges that the referendum creates uncertainty - that businesses are cautious in uncertain climates - but goes on to conclude that this is not the case here. Why? Much of the literature on investment emphasises the role of certainty and predictability in creating a suitable investment climate to attract businesses and long-term investment. Uncertainty surrounding the future of the UK within the EU, and a potential end or alteration to the free movement of goods, people, services and capital across British borders within the European Union could seriously harm the UK.plc's outlook. Not that there is much Mr. Cameron can do about this now, having made the promise to the electorate. S&P's does state that should it's assumptions about business here prove wide of the mark - and investment does suffer as a result of uncertainties - a downgrade could follow.

Oddly enough, having chronicled this, the next question is 'does it matter'? Well, in short, not really. Even the downgrade by Moody's had been factored in by the markets prior to its announcement, and the expectation that S&P's and Fitch will follow suit is widely assumed. Will it cause markets to reappraise their levels of risk associated with UK bonds, now the AAA has been confirmed? Unlikely. Besides, the AAA rating is becoming an increasingly rare specimen these days. The stigma of suffering a downgrade has been severely diluted by the sheer quantity of downgrades that have taken place over the past few years. 

But this state of affairs does lead to another - perhaps more important - question. If the markets are regularly factoring in risk assessments to their operations weeks (usually) before any announcement on downgrades by the CRAs, and if the impact of a downgrade has been reduced to the extent that sovereigns are no longer worried by an announcement, are we witnessing the slow demise of the role of CRAs in international markets? 

It's Finally Happened - Moody's Downgrades the UK

Moody's finally confirmed market rumours this evening and downgraded the UK's government bond rating from AAA to AA1. It cited several factors, including the sluggish growth outlook for medium-long term, anticipating that weak growth will last into the second half of the decade, posing challenges for the government's fiscal consolidation programme. The consequences of this include the government's "high and rising debt burden" which reduces the capacity for shock absorption on the government's balance sheets. Importantly, because of the extended time frame of the fiscal consolidation plans, taking them into the next parliament, the level of risk involved has increased. Now, instead of peaking in 2014, Moody's expects the UK's gross general debt to GDP to peak in 2016 at 96 per cent, which is up from just over 90 per cent now.

Despite these problems, Moody's stresses that the UK still retains high creditworthiness, due to its competitive, well-diversified economy, previous and future fiscal consolidation and robust institutional structure. It's favourable debt structures, bond maturity lengths, and the resulting reduced interest rate risk on UK debt are all additional factors in the UK's favour. Moody's seems to believe that the government's fiscal consolidation plan will, in time, be fulfilled, given the UK's underlying economic strengths. The ratings agency does mention that the UK's exposure to the Eurozone is an issue that may become more urgent depending on how the crisis in that area progresses, however the contagion is stated to be mitigated by the UK's independent monetary policy and the status of sterling as a global reserve currency.

Moody's had changed the outlook from stable to negative in February 2012, however today's downgrade shifts the outlook back to stable. Speaking this evening in response to the downgrade, UK Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne took the news as a "stark reminder" of the troubles being faced by Britain, and vowed to "redouble" his efforts to reduce the deficit and maintain historically low interest rates for families. Interestingly, the downgrade comes less than a month ahead of the Chancellor's budget on March 20th in which he will outline fiscal policy for the coming months. 

But will the downgrade actually make any real difference? 

The short answer to this is, well, economically no, but politically, maybe. For a start, bond markets are usually a couple of months ahead of ratings agencies when it comes to anticipating difficulties and slow growth prospects, and sterling has fallen significantly against the dollar over the past few months. This has the advantage of making exports cheaper, helping the UK economy, but it tends to signal that all is not well for economic outlooks (regardless of rumours of currency wars). More to the point, rumours have been circulating for some weeks - some even publicly - that the UK is on the verge of a downgrade. The announcement tonight by Moody's should not have surprised anyone. Will bond yields increase dramatically when the markets open on Monday morning? Unlikely. And considering the role call of countries who have been downgraded over the past few years, the UK is simply the latest to join the list.

But the political issue is slightly trickier. Like other political leaders across the western world, Osborne staked a good deal of political capital on maintaining the AAA rating. I recently posted about the French reaction to their downgrade from AAA. But it's loss in the UK may prove to be a double-edged sword. While it may force reappraisal of fiscal policy, it might also give the Chancellor some room to breathe and reassess his options.

Undoubtedly it marks a recognition by a CRA that the deficit reduction plan is not working as successfully as planned, and that plans for growth haven't produced the desired results. Fiscal policy to get Britain moving after the recession focused around shifting from domestic consumption to an export-oriented base. But as nearly 40 per cent of UK exports are destined for Europe, the ongoing recessions there are less than encouraging. You simply cannot build growth by exporting to contracting economies. The good news is that the markets still appear to have faith in the political and economic ambitions of the UK government. Bond yields remain persistently low, despite some warning of a collapse in the bond markets as seen by Greece. The economic reputation of the UK remains intact, but questions are likely to be asked over the coming days about the political will to stick to austerity, especially given the backlash against pure austerity in other parts of the world, notably Japan and France. It will be interesting to see, therefore, if the Chancellor's "plan A" will be "tweaked" slightly to take account of the latest developments, and shift slightly away from austerity towards growth.

14th January - 'Au revoir' AAA

On the 14th January, France finally - and officially - lost its AAA credit rating. Had Sarkozy not made such a fuss about the importance of retaining it last year, it might not have been such a big deal. As it is, reports speak of Eurozone doom and little else. In total, nine countries in the Eurozone were downgraded; Italy, Spain, Cyprus and Portugal were cut two notches, with the latter two given "junk" ratings. Austria, Slovakia, Slovenia and Malta were the other countries downgraded. Germany kept its AAA rating.

But what do the downgrades mean? The sovereign debt rating is an instrument designed to gauge the likelihood of a state being able to repay its debts. There are several considerations that come into play here, discussed in another post. But here's where France and the UK differ - if the UK runs into problems repaying debts, the Bank of England can print more money and off we all go. The government has shown that it is not afraid to turn to quantitative easing, and this is an important reason why the UK - even with current debt levels - is much less likely to default that France, regardless of the devaluation that occurs. Germany has repeatedly blocked moves to allow the European Central Bank to print Euros, so France only has a finite supply. Considering Germany's experience with hyper-inflation in the 1920s, this is understandable, but leaves the Eurozone in a difficult situation.

Moreover, considering France was one of the main backers of the EFSF, the loss of a French AAA rating clearly had implications for the future of the fund. Two days later Standard & Poor's downgraded the EFSF from AAA to AA+. The loss of AAA ratings effectively reduced the fund's AAA rated guarantees from €440 billion to €260 billion. Approximately €40 billion of this will go to bailing out the Irish Republic and Greece, while €100 billion had been ear-marked for a second Greek bailout. Due mainly to procrastination and posturing on the part of Eurozone leaders, this latter has now risen to an expected €145 billion, however Greece is currently under huge pressure to implement further austerity reforms before this second bailout will be agreed.

The Lawsuits Keep Coming

The case against Standard and Poor's finally got underway on October 7th in Australia. Thirteen towns were sold AAA-rated Constant Proportion Debt Obligations (CPDO's - also known as "Rembrandts" by the Australian firm Local Government Financial Services in 2006. According to Standard and Poor's, who rated the synthetic derivatives, there was less than a 1% chance of failure. Within two years the products had crashed, resulting in losses of $15 million for the affected councils. Standard and Poor's has been charged on two fronts. Firstly, as the  CPDOs were new products, they did not have sufficient information to accurately rate them. Secondly, they are charged with bowing to pressure from the issuing bank, ABN Amro, to issue a favourable rating.
In responses, Standard and Poor's has rehearsed familiar arguments, stating that "rating is an art, not a science", and reminding us of recent US judgments declaring ratings no more than "predictive opinions". See previous posts on the Ohio case here.

These may be revisited, however, as on September 30th a judge sitting in Albuqureque denied rating companies' requests to have claims brought against them dismissed. The case is being brought against all three big ratings agencies (Moody's, Standard and Poor's and Fitch) by Maryland-National Capital Park & Planning Commission Employees’ Retirement and the Midwest Operating Engineers Pension Trust Fund. They are representing investors who lost $5 billion in Thornburg Mortgage Home Loans Inc. mortgage- backed securities which were rated AAA.

Developments will be posted here.

France downgraded due to "technical error"

Standard and Poor's mistakenly downgraded France yesterday due to a "technical error". This was at the expense of France, who, along with the rest of Europe, are still incandescent over the episode. It appears that a message was sent out to some subscribers stating that France's sovereign rating had been downgraded. However less than two hours later the agency withdrew the statement and reconfirm the country's AAA/A-1+ rating. The erroneous announcement caused a surge in French 10-year bond yields by up to 28 basis points, up to 3.456 per cent, although these fell again following the retraction.

Last month, Moody's stated that France was - financially speaking - the weakest economy in Europe to still cling on to its AAA credit rating, and put it on a three-month review period (see earlier post here). French bank exposure to Greek and Italian debt means that this situation has not changed.
The technical error prompted French Finance Minister Francois Baroin to ask market regulators in France and Europe to investigate the "causes and potential consequences" of Standard and Poor's actions. France's stock market regulator, AMF, subsequently opened an investigation into the incident. France's fiscal policy is premised on its AAA rating, and Nikolas Sarkozy has effectively pinned his re-election hopes on retaining the rating. A second package of austerity measures in three months was announced this week by the French prime minister, Francois Fillon.

A downgrade for France would almost certainly entail a downgrade of the EFSF, which could pose big problems for the rest of Europe. However, considering that the Fund is unlikely to be able to cover significant bail out for larger European economies a modest increase in interest rates is unlikely to derail its use for smaller loans. However, the unhappy incident does prompt questions about the internal controls and screening mechanisms in place in the big three ratings agencies, not least how it could take nearly two hours for the CRA to realize its error.

While there is no press release or statement on Standard and Poor's website regarding the mistake, reactions in Europe indicate that the matter is not likely to die down soon. Speaking today, Michael Barnier, European commissioner for the internal market stated how serious the error had been. He emphasized that it was imperative that market players exercise discipline and a special sense of responsibility. Mr. Barnier is due to unveil a new regulatory regime for credit rating agencies on Tuesday.

In other developments, the Isle of Man was downgraded one notch to AA+ from its AAA credit rating by Standard and Poor's today. The agency cited reasons that the economy was small, undiversified and focused on financial services, all of which left it vulnerable to market shocks. The agency stated that by diversifying the economy of the crown dependency, the Isle of Man could regain its AAA rating.

The Mystery of the Triple A rating and the Reincarnation of the CDO

Speaking last month, Christine Lagarde stated that if banks could raise sufficient funds on the open markets to meet their liabilities and Basel III requirements within the certified time (between 7 and 9% of capital to risk-weighted assets) then governments should step in and lend to the banks. No-one, it would seem, wants this outcome. The banks retaliated with claims that they were not in need of a second "bail out", and there aren't many taxpayers who would be happy with another round of bank bailouts.

But it's not just banks. At the end of last year, Ireland needed a bailout. Greece and Portugal swiftly followed, and now Italy and Spain have joined the list of those 'giving cause for concern'. The European Financial Stability Facility was set up following the Irish bailout as a means of dealing with the problem. At the time, no-one expected, and likely intended, for the fund to be used. It was intended merely as a 'back up' plan that would encourage the market to lend to Ireland. But this never happened, and now - unable to fulfil the government guarantees of banks - Ireland cannot raise money on the markets. Estimated interest rates of 7% on Irish government bonds being unsustainable, Ireland had to look elsewhere, and the EFSF was the remaining option.

The EFSF, it is anticipated, will borrow €750 trillion from the markets and will lend to countries in need.The means of the EFSF are combined with loans of up to € 60 billion coming from the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism (EFSM), i.e. funds raised by the European Commission and guaranteed by the EU budget, and up to € 250 billion from the International Monetary Fund. In other words, the fund is a special purpose vehicle (SPV) set up to lend money to countries that can't issue bonds on the markets. Investors who won't lend to Ireland and Spain because of their poor economic situations are being asked to lend to the EFSF, which will in turn lend ot Ireland and Spain. The core countries of the Eurozone have agreed to guarantee the fund, though, so each are liable for the defaults of others. Germany, France and Italy are the largest contributors, making Germany, France and Italy liable in large part for the debts of countries who borrow from that fund. So far so good.

All of the big three ratings agencies were asked to assign the fund a triple A rating - the highest possible, and each agreed. This was justified on the basis that those countries guaranteeing the loans could afford to honour their guarantees. But the fund is essentially supplying loans to people who can't borrow anywhere else because it is unlikely they'll be able to pay the loan back. It's also guaranteed by countries who aren't solvent either (Ireland, Greece, Portugal, Spain and Italy are all guarantors too). Put this way, the triple A rating assigned seems surprisingly optimistic - reminiscent almost of the CDOs that came to symbolise the worst of the sub-prime mortgage crisis.

Of course, the CRAs have defended their actions, citing Germany's surplus and the structure of guarantees involved. Indeed, Scott Mather, Pimco fund manager, has stated that if the EFSF just loans to Ireland then the fund appears to be a fairly safe bet. The problem comes if and when more countries need to borrow from the fund. By guaranteeing Ireland's loan from the EFSF, Spain, for example, will have to set aside assets to cover the guarantee, leaving less room for manoeuvre should anything go wrong, and making it more likely to need to borrow from the fund itself. The more countries that borrow, the fewer guarantors there are, and the rating assigned will drop. In the worst case scenario, Germany, and to a lesser extent France, will be left lending to the rest of Europe, and most likely writing off a significant part of any loan. This - as we are all well aware - is well after the point at which politics steps in and marks the end of the single currency experiment - and is the worse case scenario.

It is worth noting a couple of final points. The AAA rating for the fund was necessary because the investment it is seeking to attract is mainly funds. Pension funds and other investors who usually look for low(er) risk vehicles that are investing the life savings of teachers, postal workers, etc. Ireland had its first bail out nearly one year ago. It followed IMF advice and introduced strict austerity measures. The economy has shrunk by 20%, unemployment is in the high teens and debt to GDP ratio has soared to over 100%. IMF advice hasn't solved anyone's problems, yet it is still being offered as the solution, in the form of a second bailout package. Greece is in the same situation. It is estimated that Greek debt will rise form €270 billion to €340 billion in four years time. This is predicated on the assumption that Greece follows IMF advice by introducing strict austerity measures. The problem is that Greece can't afford to service its current debt levels, let alone increased levels. Massive write offs are the only way that Greece is going to be able to default 'gently', although it does bring the wisdom and the function of the EFSF into question even further.

For more on this see NPR's Planet Money podcast on the issue. An FAQ factsheet on the EFSF is available here.