EC denies its degradation by Standard & Poor's

Citing growing tensions in budget negotiations, Standard & Poor's downgraded the long-term evaluation of the European Union from AAA to AA +.

This is the second "hit" by S&P's to the EU, after the downgrades in ratings of several member-states in recent months. "In our opinion, the overall creditworthiness of the 28 member-states of the European Union has fallen. There is more discordance in the negotiations on the EU budget, signaling what we consider as increasing risks to support certain discordance," the agency said.

S&P, however, retains the short-term rating unchanged and the outlook stable, which means it has no intention to change the rating in the mid-term.


EC: The European Commission disagrees with S&P’s evaluation

The European Commission challenged categorically the decision of the agency to remove the triple "AAA" from the credit rating because of increasingly difficult budget negotiations among its members.

"The European Commission disagrees with S&P that the obligations of the member-states in respect to their contribution to the European budget can be called into question in case of tension," European Commissioner for Economic Affairs Olli Rehn said.