The Editorial Team |

Money Markets Signal Surprise S. Africa Rate Hike as Rand Falls

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – South Africa’s battered rand may receive an unexpected boost from the central bank this week if money-market rates are anything to go by. While only three out of 19 economists in a Bloomberg survey are predicting a South African Reserve Bank rate increase on Thursday, traders have been adding bets on a surprise hike. Forward-rate agreements are now putting the odds of a 25 basis-point hike at more than 50 percent,…

Trump Trade Winds Blow Egypt Oranges to Shanghai Fruit Shops

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CAIRO (Capital Markets in Africa) – Escalating global trade tensions are giving Chinese fruit stalls a little more of an international flavor. Fruit distributor Sunmoon Food Co. is shipping navel oranges from Egypt, kiwis from Italy and apples from Poland into China for the first time ever. The produce will fill the gap created when the Asian nation slapped tariffs on U.S. fruit as part of the escalating trade war between the Xi Jinping and Donald Trump administrations. With turnover of…

South Africa no longer dominates private equity transactions in Africa

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) -Private equity investors are shifting their focus away from South Africa and finding opportunities to capture growth in the rest of the continent. According to the Bright Africa 2018 report, produced annually by RisCura, South Africa has always made up a large proportion of private equity (PE) transaction activity. However, this concentration has reduced significantly from 50% in 2009 to 31% in 2017, the latest numbers show. “Sluggish GDP growth,…

Floods in Nigeria Kill More than 100, Wiping out Homes and Farms

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LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) — Rainy season flooding across Nigeria has killed more than 100 people, as water poured over the banks of the West African country’s two major rivers, and into numerous cities and towns. Officials prepared on Monday to declare a natural disaster, which would allow for the mobilization of military and other resources to 12 states that have been badly affected. President Muhammadu Buhari has authorized the equivalent of $8.2 million…

Ignoring Crash, Bitcoin Tracking Pioneer Loads Up Full Basket

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LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Undaunted by the crash in cryptocurrencies, the company that created the first exchange-traded Bitcoin trackers now wants to offer a whole basket of digital currencies to bet on. The plan is to launch an exchange-traded product based on a basket of 5 to 10 such currencies before the end of the year, according to Stockholm-based XBT Provider AB. This is “something that the market is looking for,” said Laurent Kssis,…

The Digital Transformation of Banking – Driving Constructive Economic Outcomes from the FinTech Ecosystem in Africa

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FinTech is transforming the financial services by the impact of Blockchain, Mobile Money, Open Banking and Payments Innovation in Africa. The growth of FinTech has enabled consumers to sidestep traditional ways from using banking to mobile wallets for any transaction between each other. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: The unique environment for financial services in Africa is fertile ground for innovative FinTech players who are not only disrupting but also building it from the scratch which is…

Kenya President Halves Fuel Tax, Proposes Austerity Measures

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NAIROBI(Capital Markets in Africa) – Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta proposed a 50 percent reduction on an unpopular new tax on petroleum products and promised expenditure cuts across government departments. The East African state introduced the 16 percent value-added tax on gasoline on Sept. 1 that it said would help raise 35 billion shillings ($345.8 million) to plug a budget deficit of 5.9 percent of gross domestic product in the fiscal year through June 30, 2019. “I must…

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