The recent S&P downgrade of the US Government to AA+ has given Microsoft a heads up. They are one of four US companies that still command a AAA credit rating from S&P, and they are the only tech based company. What is this country doing? Apple has more cash than the US. Microsoft has a better credit rating. We can only blame ourselves on this one. Although, (political side rant incoming) after September 11th, we were all American’s. Now that this has come about, we are so divided and placing blame on everyone else buy ourselves. I guess that old saying is true – “United we stand. Divided we fall.”

It’s a sea change from the early 1980s, when the top rating was coveted. Back then, 60 U.S. corporations held the title. By 1995, half as many were rated AAA.

Today, it’s only four: Microsoft, Exxon Mobil, Johnson & Johnson and Automatic Data Processing. (This is excluding some financial and government-affiliated organizations.)