The United States is in danger of being downgraded. The warning comes from the rating agency Fitch, which threatens the downgrading of the US if Democrats and Republicans do not reach an agreement in extremis to raise the maximum threshold for public debt. In the absence of an agreement, starting tomorrow the country will not be able to issue new debt to honor commitments with creditors.
The inconclusive negotiations between the House and the Senate, Fitch wrote, "risk undermining confidence in the role of the US dollar as the reserve currency of choice". The reaction of the US Treasury Department arrived shortly after, which took the opportunity to put pressure on the parliamentarians: Fitch's warning "reflects the urgency with which Congress should act to remove the risk of default hanging over the 'economy".
In any case, the rating agency, like the markets, maintains that the most likely prospect is that of an agreement in extremis. "Although Fitch continues to believe that the debt ceiling will be raised soon - reads a note -, the risky approach of the policy and the reduced financial flexibility could increase the risk of a default of the United States".
Fitch is the only one of the three major agencies to have a negative outlook on the US sovereign rating. Standard & Poor's cut the credit rating to AA-plus, with a stable outlook, during the last debt ceiling impasse, in August 2011. Moody's, on the other hand, rates the credit rating at AAA and a stable outlook .
