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  3. "We will safeguard Britain’s credit rating with a credible plan to eliminate the bulk of the structural deficit over a parliamen

"We will safeguard Britain’s credit rating with a credible plan to eliminate the bulk of the structural deficit over a parliamen

admin2018-03-01  29
问题     "We will safeguard Britain’s credit rating with a credible plan to eliminate the bulk of the structural deficit over a parliament," read the 2010 Conservative manifesto. Well, so much for that. The decision by Moody’s, one of the three big rating agencies, to downgrade Britain from Aaa to Aal on February 22nd was a colossal embarrassment. Moody’s now ranks Britain’s credit lower than that of Luxembourg or the Isle of Man.
    Will the downgrade harm the economy? In the past countries with lower credit ratings have had to pay higher borrowing costs. But neither America, which was downgraded in 2011, or France, which suffered a similar fate last year, has suffered much.
    It is hard to spot an immediate impact in Britain, either. Investors had expected the ratings agencies to act after last year’s autumn statement revealed that the government was struggling to reduce its deficit on schedule. The two other big ratings agencies—Fitch and Standard & Poor’s—both have Britain on "negative watch". Sterling dropped to a 32-month low against the dollar and reached its weakest level against the euro since October 2011.
    Pull back a little, though, and the picture is more worrying. So far the pound is the weakest major currency of 2013. It has fallen even farther than the yen, where the decline had the explicit backing of the Japanese prime minister. In the past few weeks gilt yields have been rising relative to the cost of borrowing of the German government, too.
    Several things are making investors prudent of British assets. As Moody’s noted in justifying its downgrade, the performance of the economy has been poor; figures released on February 27th showed that GDP had shrunk by 0.3% in the fourth quarter of 2012 and is still 3% smaller than it was in the first quarter of 2008. Growth forecasts for the next few years were lowered in the autumn statement.
According to the text, Moody’s is ______.
选项 A、an agency that helps the parliament to deal with deficit
B、a department that supervises other government sectors
C、an agency that involves and makes decisions on credit rating
D、an organization that helps protect the country’s credit rating
答案C
解析 根据出题顺序和题干中的“Moody’s”一词定位到第一段第二行：The decision by Moody’s, one of the three big rating agencies...可以推测Moody’s和rating有关系，而选项C和D都涉及这个词，我们可以先排除A、B两项。再根据句中的“decision”一词，我们知道Moody’s的作用是作决定，而非选项D的“protect the country”，故选项C正确。
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