2025 Q2 Shadow Credit Ratings to Download in Excel
The Country Insights Model is a comprehensive quantitative tool for assessing country and sovereign risk by measuring a country’s risk of external and domestic financial shocks and its ability to grow. We produce Shadow Credit Ratings for 162 countries, comparable to those from credit rating agencies.
The ratings are based on our Country Strength Index (CSI), which is our most comprehensive assessment across our full range of Country Insights data. The ratings are consistent with our 2025 Q2 Country Insights update.
Figure 1 compares the average sovereign credit ratings assigned by major credit rating agencies with our Country Strength Index (CSI). Countries falling within the confidence band exhibit a close correlation between the two measures, suggesting that credit ratings are broadly aligned with underlying country fundamentals. This group includes selected upper middle-income economies as Moldova, Turkey, Georgia, Albania, Guatemala, Mexico, and others.
Several countries, however, fall below the confidence band, indicating that the CSI scores them more favorably than the rating agencies do. This may suggest that these countries are potentially underrated, with structural fundamentals stronger than reflected in their ratings. An example of this is Ukraine. In May 2025, Fitch Ratings affirmed Ukraine at Restricted Default (RD) and a month later S&P Global maintained the country’s rating at Selective Default (SD); similarly, Moody’s argues that “the impact of the war with Russia will continue to pose long-lasting challenges to Ukraine's economy and public finances”. Our model suggests, however, that while the country scores below average in the external adjustment capacity pillar, it is supported by the institutional robustness and social inclusion pillars and this would translate into a CCC rating.
Conversely, a number of countries appear above the confidence band, suggesting that credit rating agencies assign higher scores than warranted by their CSI values. A notable example is China, where the institutional robustness and the medium-term growth potential weighs down on the country’s strength index.
Figure 1: Shadow Ratings for Selected Upper Middle-Income Economies
Source: Continuum Economics
See Article Resources (below) to access the full range of scores.