S&P Gives Barbados A High Credit Rating

by Mike Godfrey, Tax-News.com, New York

16 May 2002

After Standard & Poor’s in New York “affirmed” Barbados’ credit ratings and put the key foreign currency rating at A- (minus), S&P analyst Joydeep Mukherji told an interviewer:

"We have a stable outlook on the country and it basically means that the downturn in the global economy hasn’t changed our view about Barbados. Obviously, things are worse than last year, or two years ago but not enough to change the ratings in any way. We are being conservative and steady."

Mr Mukherji said that Barbados had the highest rating of any of the countries that S&P rates in the Caribbean, and was on a level with second-tier European countries and with Chile, the highest-rated country in South America. He said the rating reflected S&Ps belief that the Barbadian economy is well-placed to ward off external shocks despite its reliance on a fixed exchange rate.

Said the analyst: "(Barbados) is an unrecorded success story in the Caribbean and in the Western hemisphere as a whole. Our rating says that. By giving it an A- rating for a country of 260,000 people roughly and such a small surface area to have that kind of rating means that a lot of careful planning and good economic management have taken place."

Recommended