As seen during the eurozone crisis, so-called advanced economy sovereign issuers were not
able to avoid market turmoil, with several countries forced into official financing programmes
funded by the Troika of the EU, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary
Fund (Greece; Portugal; Ireland; Cyprus). The rating downgrades of these countries reflected
partly the loss of market access but also a number of other factors including high debt levels,
fiscal imbalances and highly negative growth metrics.