U.S. credit rating at risk: former agency chief

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner talks to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke before a meeting in the Secretary's office at the Treasury Department, May 7, 2009.

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The United States is at risk of losing its triple-A credit rating unless it starts putting its finances in order, a former head of the agency in charge of fiscal accountability said in the Financial Times on Wednesday.

David Walker, former director of the Government Accountability Office, cited a warning from Moody's Investors Service nearly two years ago about ballooning healthcare and social security costs.

"Signs are abound that we are in even worse shape now, and that confidence in America's ability to gain control of its finances is eroding," the former comptroller general and current chief executive of Peter G. Peterson Foundation, wrote to the FT.

His comments helped push the dollar index to a four-month low as investors refocused attention on rising U.S. debt issuance, traders said.

(Reporting by Kazunori Takada)