OREANDA-NEWS. On March 09, 2009 Fitch Ratings said that it may downgrade Russian, Kazakh and Ukrainian corporate bonds as the world financial crisis may impede corporate governance improvement, reported the press-centre of KASE.

These countries are most of all exposed to the world financial crisis influence. They all suffer from production reduction and recession, problems in the banking sector and corporate bonds re-funding. Russia and Kazakhstan are affected by the world oil prices decline.

"Weak corporate governance may constrain the rating of a company regardless of how strong its financial profile is, and recent improvements tend to have been driven primarily by international listing and funding requirements", - says Fitch.

Fitch emphasized recent improvement of the situation in all three countries and that Russia appears to have achieved more advanced corporate governance.