Global upgrades beat downgrades for first time since 2000, Moody's says

New York, April 6 - Upgrades beat downgrades globally in the three months to January, the first time they have done so since 2000, according to Moody's Investors Service.

During the first quarter of this year there were 0.99 downgrades per upgrade, down from 1.3 downgrades per upgrade in the last quarter of 2003 and 3.9 downgrades per upgrade a year earlier.

But Moody's analyst Hong Sherwin cautioned that the improvement has not been uniform worldwide.

The gains in credit quality were greatest outside North America and Europe. For the Asia Pacific region, upgrades outnumbered downgrades 3.5 to 1 while the figure for Latin America was 2.4 to 1.

For North America, downgrades still outnumbered upgrades although the ratio fell to 1.3 from 2.6 in the previous three months, Moody's said.

Junk rated creditors performed better than investment-grade names, seeing more upgrades than downgrades, while investment-grade issuers still saw downgrades outnumber upgrades.

Moody's also noted that rising stars outnumbered fallen angels by a wide margin.

Looking ahead, the figures for issuers under review point to an improving trend.

Although the proportion of issuers on review for downgrade rose slightly to 3.5% from 3.4% the previous quarter, the number on review for upgrade rose to 2.3% form 1.9%, Moody's said.

Outlook changes are positive, as well. During the quarter upward outlook changes outnumbered downward changes by 1.4 to 1.

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