U.S. Outlook Cut to Negative by Fitch After Committee Fails

The U.S. lost its last stable outlook from the three biggest credit-ranking companies after Fitch Ratings lowered the nation to negative following a congressional committee’s failure to agree on deficit cuts.

Fitch’s outlook on the U.S., which it still assigns its top AAA grade, reflects “declining confidence that timely fiscal measures necessary to place U.S. public finances on a sustainable path will be forthcoming,” making the probability of a downgrade greater than 50 percent over two years, the company said yesterday in a statement. Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s Investors Service said Nov. 21 that the so-called supercommittee’s inability to reach an agreement didn’t merit downgrades because the inaction will trigger $1.2 trillion in automatic spending cuts.

U.S. government debt rallied the most since the end of 2008 during the third quarter after Standard & Poor’s stripped the U.S. of its AAA ranking on Aug. 5, while global equities lost $9.7 trillion in market value during that period. Even with lawmakers reluctant to embrace the automatic cutbacks that helped prevent downgrades, President Barack Obama has pledged to veto any efforts to undermine the spending reductions.

“There’s a much broader recognition out there that you can’t just cut discretionary spending, you have to actually cut into the meat and bone of the programs driving the deficit,” Noel Hebert, a credit strategist at Mitsubishi UFJ Securities USA Inc. in New York, said yesterday in a telephone interview. Fitch is “catching up to the dysfunction that’s been widely perceived by the American electorate for the last decade.”
Treasuries Outperform

Treasuries have returned 3.8 percent through yesterday since S&P made its rating cut, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch indexes. German bunds gained 1.9 percent, Japanese bonds rose 0.1 percent, and U.S. corporate debt handed investors a 0.4 percent loss, the indexes show.

The MSCI All Country World Index dropped 6 percent, and the Standard & Poor’s GSCI Total Return Index (MXWD) of commodities was little changed.

Treasuries due in 10 years and more have returned almost 28 percent in 2011, the most among 144 bond indexes compiled by Bloomberg and the European Federation of Financial Analysts Societies after accounting for changes in currency rates.

Bloomberg