Financial rating of the Brussels-Capital Region

In 2025 verlaagde het Amerikaanse bureau Standard & Poor's de rating van het Brussel-Hoofdstedelijke Gewest van A+ naar A, met een negatief vooruitzicht. Op de schaal van AAA tot D geeft deze beoordeling aan dat het Gewest een sterke capaciteit behoudt om aan haar financiële verplichtingen te voldoen, maar kwetsbaar blijft voor economische ontwikkelingen.

Deze beslissing weerspiegelt verschillende uitdagingen:

1. Een hoge schuldenratio, wat de fiscale speelruimte beperkt.
2. Een aanzienlijke druk op de overheidsfinanciën, gekoppeld aan investeringen en structurele uitgaven.

De directe gevolgen zijn beperkt: de Gewest heeft al financiering onder gunstige voorwaarden verkregen en haar bronnen via de Europese Investeringsbank gediversifieerd. De Brusselse regering zet zich in om de schulden te beheersen en de begrotingsdiscipline te versterken om het vertrouwen te herstellen en de situatie te stabiliseren.
 

Given the challenges facing the Region, Belgium and Europe, a good financial rating of the Region is an undeniable positive factor. This allows the Region to pursue its policy at a competitive financing cost. In this way, it helps to protect the people of Brussels and the government policy aimed at those people of Brussels. However, the extent to which the Region can maintain this rating depends on its ability to provide stable multi-year budget prospects.

Financial ratings reflect the financial health of a state, a company or any entity that relies on the public market for financing. Compare it with the nutriscore. This rating is assigned to food in supermarkets and assesses the nutritional quality of products. This gives consumers a reliable and uniform criterion on which to base their choices.

Similarly, investors can assess the financial quality and health of an entity, such as a regional government, based on a financial rating. After all, these ratings provide a comprehensive picture of an organization's credit story: assessments, risk research and essential insights.

Specialized agencies assign these ratings to whoever issues a bond. Three leading agencies are widely recognized by the financial markets for this: Standard and Poor's Global Ratings, Fitch Ratings and Moody's.

To give (good) ratings, the agencies carry out an in-depth analysis. Although each of these agencies has its own specific expertise, the themes analyzed are broadly the same for authorities such as the Brussels Capital Region:

• the institutional framework
• the general economic situation
• the budget performance
• the financial management in the broadest sense of the word.

Based on their results, the rating agencies assign a rating to the organization or state/region.

It is on the basis of this rating that investors decide whether they can lend money to our Region and at what rate. The ratings vary slightly depending on which agency assigns the rating, but always range from AAA, the highest level, to C, at the bottom of the ladder. Debtors in default receive a D.