Moody’s Investors Services expects SA's economic growth to pick up slowly, boosting the chances the country will escape a credit rating downgrade in the near future. “We think things look fairly stable and see a small chance of a ratings move – either up or down – in the next eight months,” Lucie Villa, a senior analyst with the firm’s sovereign risk group, said at a presentation in Johannesburg on Thursday. “We expect a broad-based recovery, and the worst is probably behind us,” Villa stated, and expressed the opinion that despite two quarters of negative economic growth this year, growth will come in positive for 2018, but below 1%. Moody’s expects the weak business confidence to prevail until the elections next year. Two aspects support this view. The first is that Moody’s expects global growth to remain buoyant, and the country is very integrated with the global economy, which means that while domestic economic activity will remain tepid, the global economy will be supportive. ...
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