Earlier this month, Fitch Ratings downgraded the credit rating of African Export-Import Bank, or Afreximbank, to BBB-, one notch above junk, with a negative outlook — a major blow for the Cairo-based lender, which has become a key player in Africa’s trade finance scene.
The bank was quick to push back, saying Fitch’s decision was based on an “erroneous view.” The African Union’s credit review body argued that it was a “misclassification of Afreximbank's sovereign exposures to the Governments of Ghana, South Sudan and Zambia” as non-performing loans.
But behind the dispute lies a deeper issue — one that goes beyond credit ratings and strikes at the heart of how emerging multilateral lenders in emerging economies are defined and treated by the international financial system.