Does Nigeria's Sovereign Bond Market Anticipate Rating Actions?

Abstract

This study tests whether Nigeria's US-dollar sovereign curve contains decision-useful information about subsequent rating actions. It separates issuer-specific repricing from global risk, benchmarks historical negative episodes and the May 2026 positive action against matched non-event periods, and evaluates whether directional moves are sufficiently unusual to support an early-warning process.

Keywords: sovereign ratings · bond yields · market anticipation · Nigeria