> S&P cuts Russia's outlook on bank bailout costs
> http://www.reuters.com/article/companyNewsAndPR/idUSLN63501220081023
> Thu Oct 23, 2008
>
>
> LONDON, Oct 23 (Reuters) - Credit ratings agency Standard & Poor's cut
> its outlook for the Russian Federation to negative from stable on
> Thursday,
> warning of the costs of bailing out troubled banks and a rising risk of a
> budget deficit.
Hilarious. I suspect this is the last gasp of that murderous swine Saakashvili, who has been calling in his Wall Street chits to try to do a hatchet job on Russia for months now. For decades, ratings agencies stamped oceanic quantities of CDO sludge and toxic mortgage waste as AAA, in exchange for fat fees from underwriters galore - the acme of crony capitalism.
Russia has, incidentally, a sizable budget surplus, zero foreign debt, a functional state, and half a trillion in rocksolid currency reserves. The state also owns 35% of the Russian stock market and 90% of the banking system. After enduring a decade of hell, Russia has one of the safest economies on the planet right now.
-- DRR