The Editorial Team |

S&P cuts Nigeria to B+ on weak oil, cites political risk

ABUJA (Reuters) – Credit agency Standard & Poor’s downgraded Nigeria’s rating to B+ from BB- on Friday, saying the decline in oil prices in the past seven months had significantly affected the country’s finances. Setting a stable outlook on the new rating, it also said political risk was a significant factor while the country’s non-oil sector would support economic growth. Nigeria holds a presidential election on March 28 when Goodluck Jonathan will seek another term….

African Inflation Snapshot: February 2015

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Angola inflation rises to 7.73 percent: Angola’s consumer inflation edged up to 7.73 percent year-on-year in February from 7.44 percent in January, data from the statistics office. On a month-on-month basis, prices were up 0.76 percent after a 0.72 percent increase previously. Botswana’s inflation falls to 2.8 percent: The annual inflation rate in February 2015 was 2.8 percent, a drop of 0.8 of a percentage point on the January 2015 rate of 3.6 percent. Annual…

Moody’s downgrades Ghana’s sovereign rating to B3; outlook negative

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Moody’s Investors Service has today downgraded Ghana’s issuer and senior unsecured rating by one notch to B3 from B2. The outlook on the rating is negative. The key drivers of today’s rating action are the following: 1) Deteriorating debt dynamics as reflected by an increasing debt burden due to large fiscal imbalances and a sharp weakening of the country’s national currency, combined with reduced debt affordability stemming from a high cost of funding in the…

Zambia central bank to address volatile kwacha

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LUSAKA (Reuters) – Zambia’s central bank will take measures to deal with the volatility in the kwacha’s exchange rate against the dollar, including tightening liquidity in the market, new Governor Denny Kalyalya said on Friday. The kwacha turned on his comments, firming by 1.3 percent to 7.55, having earlier fallen more than 1.1 percent against the greenback. The currency weakened to a record low of 7.7500 on Thursday. The local unit has fallen about 20…

Global Corporate Bond Issurance and Outlook

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After advancing by 33% annually in 2012 to a record $1.134 trillion, 2013’s US$-denominated investment grade (IG) bond issuance dipped by -1.5% to $1.119 trillion. Following 2012’s 48% annual surge, US$-denominated high yield bond issuance advanced by 11% to a record $431 billion in 2013. Also, after gaining 5% in 2012, newly rated high yield bank loan programs increased by 38% annually to $579 billion in 2013. In 2014, US$-denominated bond issuance edged up by…

Moody’s ASIA PACIFIC Economic Outlook

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China’s data for the first two months of the year were fairly dismal. Most activity indicators suggest that there are large downward pressures on the economy, which means that the government will need to ease measures if it is to keep the economy growing close to its target. Industrial production grew just 6.8% y/y in the first two months of the year, down from a 7.9% increase in December. This was due to further weakness…

Moody’s: M&A Props Up Corporate Issuance

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A recent surge in merger activity brings the current year’s pace in line with last year’s massive gains. Such heavy dealmaking volume is likely to persist, given favourable capital markets and the desire of firms to gain scale amid weak profit growth. That merger trend can give a great lift to corporate debt issuance, despite earlier expectations for a slowdown in corporate borrowing. Adding to the favourable environment for both issuance and M&A is a…

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