Local time on the 16th, the international credit rating agency Moody's announced a downgrade of the US sovereign credit rating. White House Communications Director and Presidential Assistant Steven Zhang criticized Moody's Chief Economist Zandi by name on the same day, considering the downgrade as a "political decision targeting Trump".
Steven Zhang posted on X platform: "Mark Zandi, an economist at Moody's who was once an advisor to Obama and a donor to Clinton, has been an 'anti-Trump' figure since 2016. No one will take his 'analysis' seriously; he has been proven wrong time and again."
Screenshot from X platform
Earlier that day, Moody's announced that due to the increase in the proportion of US government debt and interest payments, the agency decided to downgrade the US sovereign credit rating from Aaa to Aa1 and adjust the outlook for the US sovereign credit rating from "negative" to "stable".
In the rating announcement, Moody's stated that over the past decade, the proportion of US government debt and interest payments has risen significantly above the level of countries with similar ratings, and continuous large-scale fiscal deficits will further increase the burden of government debt and interest expenditures. The US fiscal situation is very likely to continue to deteriorate.
The other two major international credit rating agencies, Fitch and Standard & Poor's, have downgraded the US sovereign credit rating respectively in 2023 and 2011. Currently, the US has lost the highest AAA rating in all three main international credit rating agencies.
Last September, a Moody's team released a research warning that if no substantial debt reduction measures were taken, the US would lose its only AAA rating among the world's three rating agencies. William Foster, senior vice president of Moody's, said at that time that the new US administration must address the issue of expanding budget deficits; without corrective measures, the debt situation would become increasingly unsustainable and would not meet the AAA rating criteria.
Data shows that the total US federal government debt has now exceeded $36 trillion, with $6.5 trillion worth of Treasury bonds maturing in June alone. According to US Treasury data, the federal government's fiscal deficit for the first half of the 2025 fiscal year has already exceeded $1.3 trillion, which is the second-highest semiannual figure in history.
In addition, due to the indiscriminate imposition of tariff measures on trading partners by the new US administration, the US economy itself has also suffered significant setbacks. Data from the US Department of Commerce shows that GDP in the first quarter of this year contracted by 0.3% on an annualized basis. This is the worst quarterly performance of the US economy since 2022.
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Original source: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7505312765511352867/
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