Standard & Poor’s to reduce ratings of EU economies

Standard & Poor’s expressed readiness to reduce credit ratings of most states of the euro zone due to debt crisis. 15 states, including Germany and France, will have their ratings reconsidered. Only Greece is not included in the rating due to its very low rating set in July and Cyprus with its rating confirmed at BBB with a negative forecast.

The rating agency says that the negative forecasts are based on worsening credit conditions of the euro zone, increase of income from state bonds, disagreements of EU leaders on coping with the recession and high risks of recession in 2012. Moody’s and Fitch also warned about rating reconsideration, ITAR-TASS reports.

January futures for Light Sweet Crude Oil in New York dropped by $0.47 (0.47%) to $100.52 per barrel at 9.04 am. January futures for Brent dropped by $0.54 (0.49%) to $109.27 per barrel, RIA Novosti reports.

US indexes for services in November 2011 dropped from 52.9% in October to 52%. The index was worse than expected, analysts forecasted an increase from 52.9% to 53.8%.

US industrial orders reduced by $1.6 billion (0.4%) in October, compared with September, and reached $450 billion. Experts expected a drop by 0.3%.