S&P latest tally sees five more rising stars, five more fallen angels

By Susanna Moon

Chicago, April 28 - Standard & Poor's said it has upgraded five issuers to investment grade from speculative grade since March 15, and the tally of potential rising stars remained steady at 21 issuers.

The five new rising stars are the Republic of Colombia, Ecopetrol SA, Braskem SA (Odebrecht SA), IXE Banco SA (IXE Grupo Financiero SAB de CV) and IFCO Systems NV, according to an agency news release.

The number of companies upgraded from junk this year rose to 13 as of April 15 and account for $44.4 billion of rated debt.

"This is significantly less than the $141.0 billion, or €96.2 billion, in rated debt attributable to the 16 fallen angels - issuers downgraded to speculative grade - so far this year," Diane Vazza, head of S&P's global fixed-income research, noted in the release.

The 21 potential rising stars have $88.5 billion of rated debt. They are companies rated BB+ with either positive outlooks or ratings on CreditWatch with positive implications.

In a separate release, the agency also said it downgraded the Republic of Portugal to BBB- on March 29, which created one new fallen angel and added six Portuguese companies plus the Republic of Portugal to the list of potential fallen angels.

Economic tensions in Europe and problems in the Middle East continue to add to the growing number of fallen angels this year, the agency said.

S&P said it counted five more fallen angels, or companies downgraded to junk from investment grade, since its last report.

Vazza attributed three of the downgrades to junk to tensions in Europe and the Middle East, bringing the number of fallen angels worldwide this year to 16.

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