Saturday, February 23, 2013

Death Cafes

From TheAlexJonesChannel

UK Pound Crashes on Ratings Downgrade

The GBP crashed 1.5 US cents on the Moody's downgrade, even though it had been widely expected by the markets, although probably not this soon.


Charts from xe.com

Moody's downgrades UK's bond rating to AA1 from AAA

List of G20 nations that still have AAA ratings from Moody's:

Australia
Canada
Germany

From moodys.com

Original source

Rating Action:

Moody's downgrades UK's government bond rating to Aa1 from Aaa; outlook is now stable

Global Credit Research - 22 Feb 2013

London, 22 February 2013 -- Moody's Investors Service has today downgraded the domestic- and foreign-currency government bond ratings of the United Kingdom by one notch to Aa1 from Aaa. The outlook on the ratings is now stable.

The key interrelated drivers of today's action are:

1. The continuing weakness in the UK's medium-term growth outlook, with a period of sluggish growth which Moody's now expects will extend into the second half of the decade;

2. The challenges that subdued medium-term growth prospects pose to the government's fiscal consolidation programme, which will now extend well into the next parliament;

3. And, as a consequence of the UK's high and rising debt burden, a deterioration in the shock-absorption capacity of the government's balance sheet, which is unlikely to reverse before 2016.

At the same time, Moody's explains that the UK's creditworthiness remains extremely high, rated at Aa1, because of the country's significant credit strengths. These include (i) a highly competitive, well-diversified economy; (ii) a strong track record of fiscal consolidation and a robust institutional structure; and (iii) a favourable debt structure, with supportive domestic demand for government debt, the longest average maturity structure (15 years) among all highly rated sovereigns globally and the resulting reduced interest rate risk on UK debt.

The stable outlook on the UK's Aa1 sovereign rating reflects Moody's expectation that a combination of political will and medium-term fundamental underlying economic strengths will, in time, allow the government to implement its fiscal consolidation plan and reverse the UK's debt trajectory. Moreover, although the UK's economy has considerable risk exposure through trade and financial linkages to a potential escalation in the euro area sovereign debt crisis, its contagion risk is mitigated by the flexibility afforded by the UK's independent monetary policy framework and sterling's global reserve currency status.

In a related rating action, Moody's has today also downgraded the ratings of the Bank of England to Aa1 from Aaa. The issuer's P-1 rating is unaffected by this rating action. The rating outlook for this entity is now also stable.

RATINGS RATIONALE 

The main driver underpinning Moody's decision to downgrade the UK's government bond rating to Aa1 is the increasing clarity that, despite considerable structural economic strengths, the UK's economic growth will remain sluggish over the next few years due to the anticipated slow growth of the global economy and the drag on the UK economy from the ongoing domestic public- and private-sector deleveraging process. Moody's says that the country's current economic recovery has already proven to be significantly slower -- and believes that it will likely remain so -- compared with the recovery observed after previous recessions, such as those of the 1970s, early 1980s and early 1990s. Moreover, while the government's recent Funding for Lending Scheme has the potential to support a surge in growth, Moody's believes the risks to the growth outlook remain skewed to the downside.

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Carbon Porn?

Is this the first case of mainstream carbon porn? Maybe one day the only place you will be able to see wood burning is on youtube.


Abby Martin and George Galloway on how we got into this mess

Abby interviews George at the 15:37 mark onwards.

From breakingtheset