{"id":1004035820,"date":"2012-01-17T04:25:13","date_gmt":"2012-01-17T12:25:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.commercialsearch.com\/news\/?p=1004035820"},"modified":"2022-12-08T18:02:07","modified_gmt":"2022-12-09T02:02:07","slug":"economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.commercialsearch.com\/news\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\/","title":{"rendered":"Economy Watch: The French Ratings Surprise"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>January 17, 2012<\/strong><br \/>\n<em>By Dees Stribling, Contributing Editor<\/em><br \/>\n<div id=\"attachment_1004035821\" style=\"width: 160px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a class=\"highslide\" href=\"https:\/\/www.commercialsearch.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/46\/2012\/01\/011712-EconWatch-Bank-of-France-user-ell-brown.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1004035821\" src=\"https:\/\/www.commercialsearch.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/46\/2012\/01\/011712-EconWatch-Bank-of-France-user-ell-brown.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"011712 - EconWatch Bank of France user ell brown\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-1004035821\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1004035821\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Image courtesy Flick user ell brown<\/p><\/div><\/p>\n<p>Just when things in the euro zone were getting a little too quiet, Standard &amp; Poor\u2019s proved the rumors true late on Friday by downgrading the sovereign-debt rating of nine euro-using countries at one go, especially France, a long-time AAA country that fell a spot to AA+ (which puts it on par with the U.S.). Also, Austria, Malta, Slovakia and Slovenia were down a notch, while Cyprus, Italy, Portugal and Spain lost two notches.<\/p>\n<p>And as if that wasn\u2019t enough, on Monday the ratings agency went ahead and downgraded the euro-zone bailout fund &#8212; the European Financial Stability Fund &#8212; though that wasn\u2019t much of a surprise, since France is one of the main backers of the fund. On the other hand, some countries kept their current S&amp;P ratings. Euro-zone bastion Germany was one. But so did Belgium, Estonia, Finland, Ireland, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands.<\/p>\n<p>Investors seemed sanguine about the downgrade, which is likely a case of \u201cBeen There, Done That\u201d for many. But more fodder for a possible panic lies ahead.<\/p>\n<p>For example, Greek debt talks are wobbly &#8212; what, again? &#8212; about the issue of how much of a haircut the nation\u2019s creditors are going to take, an issue that only seemed to be settled last year. Talks between the Greeks and their creditors ground to a halt last Friday, but will resume on Wednesday. If the parties involved can\u2019t come to some terms, such an impasse might cause Greece\u2019s next bailout payment to be canceled, which might in turn cause a hard default of Greek debt, with unpredictable results for the euro.<\/p>\n<p>Investors also seem to be worrying about a slowdown in the Chinese economy. Of course, \u201cslowdown\u201d has a different meaning in China, namely less than double-digit growth. According to official statistics released by the Chinese government on month (something always to take with a little salt), the country\u2019s economy grew 8.9 percent in the third quarter of 2011, a little more than expected, but not at the previous breakneck pace.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Home Prices Finally Hit Bottom?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Reuters reported on Friday that a poll of 23 economists taken recently by the news agency found \u201ca consensus for no change in the S&amp;P\/Case-Shiller home price index in 2012,\u201d with a modest gain of 1.5 percent expected for 2013. That isn\u2019t particularly good news, if it happens, but it\u2019s hopeful in one way: At least home prices won\u2019t go down any more.<\/p>\n<p>Most of the respondents &#8212; 15 economists &#8212; also said they expected foreclosures to slow down in 2012, while five respondents thought that would happen in 2013. Whenever it does happen, a decrease in foreclosures will be a critical factor in supporting higher home prices, since the volume of foreclosed properties on the market has been an anchor for valuations for many moons now.<\/p>\n<p>Wall Street was off for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday on Monday, but ended the day on Friday moderately down. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 48.96 points, or 0.39 percent, while the S&amp;P 500 was down 0.49 percent and the Nasdaq declined 0.51 percent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Among other euro-zone nations, France lost a notch in its debt rating due to an S&amp;P downgrade. And a survey of economists revealed an expectation that home prices will see no gains &#8212; but also no losses &#8212; this year. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1201,"featured_media":1004038531,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21808,21742],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1004035820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-latest"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v28.0 (Yoast SEO v28.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Economy Watch: The French Ratings Surprise - Commercial Property Executive<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.commercialsearch.com\/news\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Economy Watch: The French Ratings Surprise\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Among other euro-zone nations, France lost a notch in its debt rating due to an S&amp;P downgrade. And a survey of economists revealed an expectation that home prices will see no gains -- but also no losses -- this year.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.commercialsearch.com\/news\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Commercial Property Executive\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/CPExecutive\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-01-17T12:25:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-12-09T02:02:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.commercialsearch.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/46\/2012\/01\/011712-EconWatch-Bank-of-France-user-ell-brown.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"270\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Nicholas Ziegler\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@cpexecutive\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@cpexecutive\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Nicholas Ziegler\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/ff3a837f33daecfcf8978b405eaae20c\"},\"headline\":\"Economy Watch: The French Ratings Surprise\",\"datePublished\":\"2012-01-17T12:25:13+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-12-09T02:02:07+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":543,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/sites\\\/46\\\/2012\\\/01\\\/011712-EconWatch-Bank-of-France-user-ell-brown.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Featured\",\"News\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.commercialsearch.com\\\/news\\\/economy-watch-the-french-ratings-surprise\\\/\",\"name\":\"Economy Watch: The French Ratings Surprise - 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