The coronavirus will push debt levels in the world’s richest nations up by almost 20 percentage points on average this year, credit rating agency Moody’s said on Monday, almost double the damage seen during the financial crash. A new report by Moody’s looked at 14 countries from the United States and Japan to Italy and Britain and assessed how coronavirus-induced economic slowdowns would scar their finances. “We estimate that on average in this group, government debt/GDP ratios will rise by around 19 percentage points, nearly twice as much as in 2009 during the Great Financial Crisis”. “Compared with the GFC, the rise in debt burdens will be more immediate and pervasive, reflecting the acuteness and breadth of the shock posed by the coronavirus”. Italy, Japan and Britain are expected to suffer the biggest debt increases at around 25 percentage points of their respective GDPs, while the […]