Rating upgrade cheers stocks

Defying the jittery economic trend on the global side, the Philippines still secured a rating upgrade from international debt watcher Moody’s Investors Service, which was eventually felt positively by the country’s equities market.

The Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) dropped 60 points in the morning session of Thursday’s trade, but clawed back minutes before news broke out that Moody’s Investors Service gave the country the last of three expected ratings upgrade. Moody’s lifted the country’s credit rating to “Baa3,” the lowest investment grade. Earlier in the year, Fitch Ratings Inc. and the Standard and Poor’s raised their respective grades for Philippine debt papers.