The Difference between Corporate Rating Migration Probability during Economic Contraction and Expansion in Indonesia

Abstract

Corporate Rating is one of the tools of Signaling Theory, expected to provide clear and standardized signals of a company’s financial health and credit risk. However, according to the experts, the regulation of Corporate Rating issuance by Credit Rating Agency (CRA) becomes a hindrance to the timeliness of company information updates, especially during sudden large-scale economic shifts. Based on this issue, this research aims to examine the differences between Corporate Rating migration probabilities under two different economic conditions: contraction and expansion. Before conducted hypothesis testing, the secondary data from 73 sample companies were processed using Markov-Switching Autoregressive (MSVAR) and Multinomial Logistic Regression methods. Ther results of this study shows that there is no difference in the probability of a Corporate Rating downgrade during both economic conditions. On the other side, the probability of a Corporate Rating upgrade is smaller during economic contraction, and there is a difference in the probability of a Corporate Rating remained unchange between both economic conditions.