Portugal got bad news on Monday and good news on Tuesday, although the former may outweigh the latter. Standard & Poor's said that it might downgrade the country's rating again, after last week's slice of two notches from the grade—this after it cut long- and short-term counterparty credit ratings for five Portuguese banks and two related subsidiaries.
The good news? The European Union (EU) General Court ruled in the nation's favor against an EU-imposed fine of more than 3.6 million euros ($5.1 million) levied against Lisbon for failure to bring the country's public procurement laws into compliance with an EU rule to meet a deadline.
Bloomberg News reported S&P's consideration of yet another sovereign ratings cut, which it said came in an e-mailed statement: "The negative CreditWatch implications on our long-term counterparty credit ratings on the Portuguese banks reflect our negative CreditWatch listing of the sovereign rating, and thus the possibility of a further sovereign downgrade" may occur "as early as this week."
