【英语国际】市场对穆迪调降希腊债券评级反应平静

Moody's Investors Service cut its credit rating on Greek sovereign debt to 'junk' on Monday, long after sovereign-debt worries had spread beyond Greece, resulting in a muted market reaction.

Moody's, a unit of Moody's Corp., downgraded Greece four notches to 'Ba1,' one notch below investment-grade, from 'A3.' Moody's also downgraded Greece's short-term debt rating to 'Not-Prime' from 'Prime-1.'

The downgrade wasn't entirely unexpected. Moody's had warned on April 29 that a 'multinotch downgrade' was 'likely.' Most notable may have been the timing, coming several weeks after a similar downgrade from Moody's rival Standard & Poor's.

In fact, Moody's had raised some bond-market eyebrows by keeping its rating on Greece so high for so long.

'Greece had been trading as junk for a while,' said Sebastien Galy, a currency strategist at BNP Paribas in New York for Greek government debt. 'The agencies are only catching up to the reality markets were trading on weeks ago.'

The third major ratings agency, Fitch Ratings, still has Greece rated one notch above junk.

Moody's defended its delay by saying it needed time to study the implications of a euro-zone/International Monetary Fund bailout package for Greece.

'We could have decided to act more forcefully earlier based on less information, however, we felt it prudent to have full details of the package and an assessment of its impact before arriving at our rating conclusions,' a Moody's spokesman said.

Moody's downgrade followed by less than a month the departure from the company of Pierre Cailleteau, the former head of its sovereign-rating group. Moody's said the timing wasn't related to the downgrade.

'The timing and magnitude of this downgrade was driven by Moody's assessment of Greece's medium-term credit fundamentals only and had no relationship whatsoever to Mr. Cailleteau's decision to leave the rating agency,' the Moody's spokesman said.

Mr. Cailleteau couldn't be reached for comment.

While some observers have criticized Moody's for being too slow, others criticized S&P for downgrading too quickly, suggesting it added fuel to the market fires.

Greek 10-year government debt yielded about 8.56% on Monday, up from about 5% before sovereign-debt worries first erupted in November. Bond yields and prices move in opposite directions. The downgrade came after the close of European markets.

Market concerns have already shifted away from Greece to other corners of the euro zone. The amounts of money wagered on a Greek default in the credit-default swap market have shrunk in recent weeks.

Now attention is turning to other countries and to problems European banks are having accessing short-term credit. Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria SA Chairman Francisco Gonzalez said on Monday that most Spanish companies and banks are suffering from a financing freeze because of worries about Spain's debt problems.

There was plenty of evidence that Greece is no longer in the spotlight for financial markets. The euro rose nearly 1% against the dollar despite the downgrade, and U.S. Treasury bonds, a safe harbor in past moments of sovereign-debt angst, were lower. Stocks were higher most of the day, before a late day decline.

In contrast, a global stock-market selloff resulted when S&P, a unit of McGraw-Hill Cos., cut Greek and Portugese sovereign-debt ratings on April 27, pushing Greece into 'junk' territory. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell nearly 2% that day, the start of a 12% correction from which it is only now, haltingly, recovering.

对希腊主权债务的担忧早已甚嚣尘上，但周一穆迪投资者服务公司(Moody's Investors Service Inc.)将希腊政府债券评级调降至垃圾级的消息并没有给市场带来多大的震动。

该公司将希腊政府债券评级下调四档，从A3下调至Ba1，还将希腊的短期债评级从优级-1 (Prime-1)下调至非优级(Not-Prime)。

这一降级并非完全出乎意料，穆迪在4月29日就已经警告过将希腊债券一次性连降几级是可能的。但最令人关注是穆迪对希腊债券降级的时间，这正好在其竞争对手标准普尔（Standard & Poor's）给予希腊债券类似降级的几周后。

实际上，穆迪之前对希腊债券的高评级时间保持过长，已经引起了债券市场的关注。

法国巴黎银行（BNP Paribas）驻纽约货币策略师盖里（Sebastien Galy）称，希腊债券在市场上被当做垃圾级债券交易已经好一阵了，穆迪现在降级也只是刚赶上市场几周前的现实状况。而全球第三大评级机构惠誉评级（Fitch Ratings）依旧给予希腊债券垃圾级之上的评级。

穆迪对拖延降级的解释是：需要时间来研究欧盟和国际货币基金组织（IMF）对希腊救助的意义。

穆迪公司的一位发言人表示，虽然可以在之前拥有较少信息的状况下来实施降级的决定，但我们觉得在作出决定结果之前需要谨慎，要掌握充分救助方案的细节并评估其影响。

另外，穆迪对希腊债券的降级发生在其前主权债务评级组负责人Pierre Cailleteau离职后的一个月内，穆迪表示降级和Cailleteau的离开没有关系。“降级的时间和幅度是仅仅基于对希腊中期信贷状况的评估。”穆迪的发言人说。

未能联系到Cailleteau本人置评。

但一些观察人士批评穆迪对希腊债券评级下调过慢，也有人批评说之前标普的评级下调过快，这之前引起了市场的担忧。周一希腊十年期国债收益率位于8.56%，远远高于去年11月债务危机前5%的水平。穆迪的降级决定在周一欧洲市场交易结束之后公布。

目前市场对希腊债务的担忧已经转移为对欧元区的整体的担忧，最近几周信贷违约互换（CDS）市场中打赌希腊债务违约的资金规模已经有所缩小。市场的注意力已经转向了欧元区其他国家和欧洲银行获得短期信贷的问题。西班牙银行Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria Sa的总裁冈萨雷斯（Francisco Gonzalez）周一表示，目前由于担忧西班牙的债务问题，大部分西班牙企业和银行正在经历融资冻结的痛苦。

很多证据表明希腊目前已经不是金融市场所关注的焦点。降级公布后，欧元兑美元反倒上升了近1%，在过去主权债务遭质疑的时刻每每被认为是避险天堂的美国国债还略微走低，而在一天内的大多数时刻，股票市场表现也好于之前一天，只是在尾盘下跌。与昨日相反，在4月27日标普调降希腊和葡萄牙主权债务为垃圾级之时，全球金融市场都涌现了大批卖盘，当日道琼斯工业指数下跌了近2%，开启了之后跌幅高达12%的下调，而股市刚刚开始从这次下调的低点回升。