Our chart of the week provides a unique insight into credit trends last year. In a nutshell, downgrades increased 54%, upgrades fell 23%, and corporate defaults increased 15% year on year. Last week followed a similar pattern with negative rating actions and defaults slowly picking up after a quiet start to 2023. Despite what the early 2023 market rally might suggest, the risks underpinning 2022 rating trends have not gone away.