Corporates
S&P Global Ratings rates over 4,600 corporates globally, giving us timely insight into cross-industry credit trends. This page is dedicated to delivering our most far-reaching, thought-provoking opinions to our stakeholders.
Corporate Earnings Themes: AI Takes Hold
AI has moved center stage in this year’s Q4 results season, as anxiety around last year’s dominant topic of tariffs has faded. We have used AI to analyze comments made in earnings calls by rated nonfinancial corporates to assess the intensity of the AI conversation by industry, and to see what themes are emerging in terms of the growing use of AI across enterprises.
Of 763 rated entities with earnings calls transcript data available in the year to Feb. 12, 336 made a significant reference to AI. The following pages set out:
- Five key AI themes that emerge from management comments
- Four emerging AI themes to watch
- A sector ranking of AI-keyword intensity in earnings transcripts
- A summary of AI-related capital expenditure comments
- Core themes per industry with illustrative company comments
Industry Report Card:
European Chemical Sector Pulse: Recovery Stalls, Divergence Increases
- Most major European chemical companies have revised their guidance for 2025 downward amid persistent demand weakness, pricing pressure, and intensifying trade and currency headwinds.
- Commodity chemicals and speculative-grade issuers face the harshest conditions, with shrinking margins, multiple downgrades over the past quarters, and little near-term relief in sight.
- Companies accelerate cost-cutting measures and increasingly focus on capital expenditure (capex) discipline to preserve cash and margins, but trade tensions and overcapacity limit upside.
- Persistently weak demand, elevated input costs, and trade-related uncertainty weigh on the sector-wide recovery, with any near-term improvements hinging on internal cost actions.
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