Global growth to continue in 2018, but SA’s ‘political uncertainty’ is a problem, says Moody’s
Credit rating agency Moody’s says a stable outlook for sovereign creditworthiness globally makes SA an outlier with a negative outlook. According to Moody’s 2018 Sovereign Outlook, healthy growth is likely to continue into 2018. "Global GDP growth will remain roughly the same as in 2017 at slightly more than 3%, and is likely to be more broad-based and sustained than in previous years." Moody’s also says there were almost half as many sovereign downgrades in 2017 (20) than in 2016 (37), which were mostly concentrated in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. Moody’s flagged SA’s downgrade as high-profile in response to the country’s "weakening institutions, declining growth and rising debt", and said, "progress is patchy; political uncertainty and social tensions can weaken the commitment to reform". Said Moody’s: "The negative rating outlooks for Brazil, SA and Turkey reflect, in part, how electoral trends and corruption scandals have, to different degrees, weakened institutional ...
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