Determinants of credit ratings: evidence from panel discrete model

Abstract

This study aims to explore how changes in explanatory variables may affect the probability of sovereign credit ratings assigned by Fitch, which is assumed to be a binary choice variable. For this purpose annual data of selected developed and developing countries for the period 2000-2016 have been used. All the data have been collected from World Bank database and Fitch website. In the empirical analysis the binary logit model has been applied. It can be concluded that the determinants of sovereign credit ratings can help sovereigns to better understand the drivers of their credit rating.