Moody’s Investors Service pushed the debt of the Chicago public schools further into junk territory on the same day last week the district’s teachers threatened to strike.
In downgrading its debt from B2 to B3, Moody’s called the district’s financial condition “precarious” and “acute.” The new rating is one notch above the C level Moody’s describes as “speculative (and) of poor standing, and are subject to very high credit risk.”
Moody’s said its revised rating “reflects the expectation that the district’s credit pressures will intensify in the current fiscal year.”