The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the global downturn will hurt the Guatemalan economy and weaken its public finances in 2020. However, we expect that these shocks--and the government's policy response--will not result in a structurally weaker financial profile for the sovereign as the economy recovers next year. As a result, we have affirmed our 'BB-/B' foreign-currency and 'BB/B' local-currency credit ratings on Guatemala. The stable outlook balances the expected economic and fiscal hits with Guatemala's solid external position, moderate general government debt to GDP, and sound monetary policy that provide key resiliency to manage the challenging and volatile global environment. On April 16, 2020, S&P Global Ratings affirmed its 'BB-' long-term foreign-currency and 'BB' long-term local-currency sovereign credit
