Ratings measure the counterparty risk for an issuer or an issue while CDs are a market evaluation of the same risk exposure. The market evaluation could be not aligned with the rating agencies' judgment and the difference could be relevant. The article presents an empirical analysis on a sample...

This paper analyzes the impact and the spillover effect of a sovereign rating announcement on the euro area CDS market. Through the event study technique, we demonstrate that downgrades and upgrades considerably affect financial markets. The relevance of the impact is due to the introduction of...