Since the South African bond market has historically been a predominantly government and government-related debt market, the use of credit ratings has been limited. With the introduction of corporate bonds in recent years, this has changed as a need has emerged for a better understanding of credit risk.
At that time, we used the word benign to describe inflation. How fast things changed: in July 2008, inflation rate hit 12.2%, the highest in 17 years. As Cyd described it, Asia is at the epicenter of the surge in inflation. Nevertheless, ours is far better than inflation rates of over 20% in other Asian countries.