Berkshire’s Negative S&P Watch Hits Almost 1,000 Muni Bonds
This article is for subscribers only.
Municipal bonds from California to Puerto Rico may lose their second-best credit rating from Standard & Poor’s after the company put Berkshire Hathaway Inc. and its core insurance units on a negative watch.
Berkshire Hathaway Assurance Corp. had the outlook on its AA+ rating cut Tuesday, and S&P began dropping its view of the 966 muni securities the insurer backs on Wednesday, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Berkshire Chairman Warren Buffett got into the muni-bond insurance business in 2008, after the subprime mortgage market began to implode.