Newsmaker: John Chambers

The Man who brought the US down

The US treasury bond has been perhaps the most resilient feature of the American economy, surviving the great depression and three subsequent wars without losing its AAA credit rating. The man who changed all that and infuriated many Americans in the process was one John Chambers, the chairman of S&P's sovereign rating committee.

While his decision—which lowered the US to a AA+ for the first time since 1917—rocked the financial world and caused markets to tumble, the downgrade was hardly a shocker. The Republican far right had humiliated President Obama into accepting a deficit deal that, while raising the debt ceiling, forced the President into accepting deep spending cuts. For a country that makes insignificant amounts of money through a tax policy that favours the rich, this spells doom for an economy growing at 1% with mediocre employment numbers. Moreover, it embittered and poisoned an already noxious political climate on Capitol Hill.

Apparently, it is precisely this pernicious political impasse that was the catalyst for the downgrade more than anything else, alluded Chambers in an interview with political correspondent Wolf Blitzer. “Our decision was motivated by two things,” said a poker faced Chambers “Increasing political polarisation which we think is going to impede the ability of policy makers to act proactively to get our public finances in order. And second, the public finances themselves—the current level of debt is high, the projected deficit is going to be in the high single digits as a share of GDP,” he added. Chambers said that in S&P’s ratings horizon, the ratio of debt to GDP would continue to rise.

The Obama Office said in response that Chambers and his organisation had erred by $2 trillion in their calculations and said that it was hasty in its decision making, eroding the integrity of S&P. This is not the only time that S&P has had its reputation questioned. Many view its stamping of worthless mortgage derivatives with a AAA rating—which sunk the world economy—as ‘criminally negligent’ behaviour.

For a man who crunched numbers for a living, Chambers’ background suggests that he would be more at home at a publishing company or a literary journal than the rarefied atmosphere of the ratings world. According to reports, he was born and raised outside Kansas City, Kansas, studied literature and philosophy at Grinell College in Iowa—generally regarded as one of the best private liberal arts colleges in the US—and was a star swimmer who ranked eighth in the university record books for his time in the 1000 metres freestyle. He then went on to do a Master’s in English Literature at Columbia University.

Apparently, he landed his first bonafide finance gig at the international department of European-American Bank, where he rose from management trainee to vice president. After working five years in various roles as sous directeur, assistant comptroller, and vice president for Banque Indosuez, Chambers joined S&P in 1993. He became deputy head of S&P's Sovereign Debt Ratings Group in 1997 and in 2005 he was named chairman of the group’s sovereign rating committee.

While Chambers has a boss—David Beers, the global head of sovereign ratings—it was John who was in the line of fire publicly for S&P’s decision. Chambers says that another downgrade is entirely possible if the US shows further fiscal slippage, making him a shoo-in candidate for an award for one of America’s most unpopular men in this decade.