The recent downgrade on the outlook of Petroliam Nasional Bhd by Moody's Investors Service will not affect the company, says Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.
"I am confident the downgrade will affect progress in Petronas," he told reporters on the sidelines at the Asia Oil and Gas Conference in Kuala Lumpur today.
The premier went on to point out that Moody's might be coming out with a wrong assessment by downgrading Petronas' domestic issuer and foreign currency senior unsecured ratings to A2 from A1 last Friday.
"Moody's assessment might not be right as sometimes people assess wrongly.
"We cannot reprimand it (Moody's) because they are free (to conduct their assessment)," he added.
When asked if he was concerned other rating agencies might also rate Malaysia to a more negative outlook, Mahathir said other agencies are free to do so.
He, however, said Malaysia may not necessarily accept the rating outlooks from these agencies.
In a statement last Friday, Moody's said it downgraded Petronas to A2 from A1 but changed the outlook to "stable" from "negative".
The rating agency said the national oil company's credit metrics remained strong but the lower ratings were due to its revised cross-sector methodology.
This is not the first time Mahathir challenged the assessments from international rating firms.
Two months ago, he questioned the decision of these agencies when the country faced a potential downgrade after the government decided to allocate RM6 billion to rescue the ailing Federal Land Development Authority (Felda) and Tabung Haji. - Mkini
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