The Editorial Team |

Moody’s downgrades Gabon’s ratings to Caa1, changes outlook to stable

LIBREVILLE (Capital Markets in Africa )- Moody’s Investors Service has today downgraded the Government of Gabon’s issuer and senior unsecured debt ratings to Caa1 from B3 and changed the outlook to stable from negative. The rating downgrade is underpinned by continuing government arrears to creditors and suppliers which point to heightened government liquidity pressures and denote institutional weaknesses. Persistent arrears also risk delaying critical financial support from the official sector, in turn exacerbating existing liquidity…

Zimbabwe’s Opposition Alliance Says It Will Scrap Bond Notes

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HARARE (Capital Markets in Africa) – Zimbabwe’s main opposition pledged to scrap bond notes and compensate former white farmers who lost their land if it’s elected to rule at the next of next month. The Movement for Democratic Change alliance will immediately scrap the controversial bond notes, with a longer-term goal of joining the rand monetary union and the Southern African Customs Union, Tendai Biti, a spokesman for group, said at the launch of its election…

Egypt Eyes Sovereign Fund By Year End to Shake Up State Assets

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CAIRO (Capital Markets in Africa) – Egypt plans to launch its first sovereign fund by the end of the year and will begin a roadshow in the first half of 2019 to drum up private investment, the country’s planning minister said. Modelled after sovereign funds in India and Malaysia, Egypt’s new investment arm will seek to generate additional wealth from under-utilized state assets rather than investing surplus oil and gas revenues as Gulf countries do….

Steinhoff Wins Reprieve as Creditors Agree to Hold Fire on Debts

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – Steinhoff International Holdings NV soared more than 50 percent after winning support from a majority of its key creditors for a standstill agreement through the end of June, giving the scandal-hit retailer breathing space to avoid insolvency proceedings. The so-called support letter for Steinhoff’s restructuring plan is the first step taken by creditors toward a debt agreement with the South African company, which in December reported accounting wrongdoing that wiped more than…

Africa Debt Servicing Costs Surge and Changes in Government Financing

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LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – S&P Global Ratings indicated that the debt-servicing costs of 11 out of 17 rated Sub-Saharan African (SSA) sovereigns that are under the Heavily Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) Initiative have increased significantly since 2011. The HIPC, which is an initiative of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund mainly, is a debt-relief program for countries that are unable to service their debt. The agency said that the initiative reduced…

Moody’s Changes Cameroon’s Outlook To Negative, Affirms B2 Rating

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YAOUNDE (Capital Markets in Africa) – Moody’s Investors Service (“Moody’s”) has changed the outlook on the Government of Cameroon’s issuer local and foreign currency ratings to negative from stable and affirmed the B2 ratings. The decision to change the outlook to negative reflects a rising likelihood that Cameroon’s fiscal strength will continue to weaken due to persistent spending pressures to fund its infrastructure investment program to support growth. Recent fiscal overruns and weak financial health…

African Private Equity Funds raise $700mn in first four months of 2018

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LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Research provider Preqin indicated that 388 private equity (PE) funds raised a total of $114.6bn to invest in emerging markets (EMs) in 2017, compared to 639 EM-focused PE funds that raised $105.3bn in 2016. The aggregate capital raised in 2017 by EM-focused PE funds represented the second highest level since 2008. Also, the number of PE funds with a primary focus on EMs accounted for 32% of total PE funds, while the…

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