European Support Fund loses his turn triple A

The beginning of the end? The optimists say no .... as for the other ... Unless all this is an attack on "rules" of the United States against the European Union, via the rating agencies interposed. Who knows ...

In any case, after the degradation of France and Austria, it is "logically" as Standard and Poor's has removed the AAA rating in the European Support Fund (EFSF) or European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) .

 The latter, established to assist countries in the euro area in difficulty should see his mathematically difficult task complexity is a little more each day.

The rating agency has lowered a notch Monday to AA + rating from the Support Fund of the euro area. However, it does not raise it to AAA if additional safeguards were to be granted.

"If we find that long-term obligations of EFSF are fully backed by the guarantees of the Member States benefiting from triple A, we may raise its rating to AAA + +," says S & P and in a statement. An announcement which follows the true "penalty" awarded Friday to nine countries in the euro area, including France and Austria, which are now rated AA +.

The decision on the EFSF is far from a surprise, the rating because it is directly dependent on those of the states in the euro area that guarantee, especially those rated, position held there for a few hours Vienna and Paris.

Reacting to the news Standard and Poor's, the head of EFSF, Klaus Regling, has sought reassurance, saying the downgrade of the Fund would not reduce its lending capacity of 440 billion euros.

"The EFSF has the resources to meet its current commitments and possibly other, by the implementation of the European Stability Mechanism (MES) in July," wished to clarify Mr. Regling in a statement.

Recall also that in early December, after placing under surveillance the main countries of the monetary union, Standard and Poor's leaving so that it might downgrade the ratings of sovereign debt of countries such as Germany and France, the agency notation was placed after the note on negative watch Support Fund in the euro area (EFSF).

 Also after a "logic" of the announcement a few hours earlier by S & P placed on negative watch the ratings by its analysts to the long-term debt of fifteen countries in the euro area. Germany and France are among the two main contributors to the EFSF, then being in the viewfinder of the rating agency. Note that the guarantee of the Fund is provided by the States of the euro area in proportion to their participation in the capital of the European Central Bank (ECB).

 Hence the concern about the S & P Fund's ability to cope with the most desperate scenarios. "Given the structure of the EFSF, if we were to lower the rating of one or more countries in the euro area, we assign it the lowest score of a country of the European Monetary formerly rated triple-A", had while S & P said in a statement. "The decision by S & P will occur within three months and if possible before," stated also the rating agency.