Russia’s No. 2 Bank Seeks Mozambique Debt Talks After Default

Russia’s No. 2 Bank Seeks Mozambique Debt Talks After Default

MAPUTO (Capital Markets in Africa) – The head of Russia’s second-biggest bank wants to meet with Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi and other officials soon to attempt to start negotiations over restructuring about $2 billion in debt, which haveyet to formally begin since the country defaulted a year ago. “We would like to convince them to start more negotiations with investors for restructuring the debt,” VTB Group Chief Executive Officer Andrey Kostin said in a Bloomberg Television interview at the World…

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Nigeria SE Falls 2.8% to 43,131.24; Dangote Cement Leads Decline

Nigeria SE Falls 2.8% to 43,131.24; Dangote Cement Leads Decline

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – The Nigerian Stock Exchange Main-Board Index fell for the third day, dropping 2.8 percent, or 1,258.61 to 43,131.24. The move was the biggest since falling 4.3 percent on May 31, 2016. The MSCI Emerging Markets Europe, Middle East and Africa Index advanced 0.4 percent. Dangote Cement Plc contributed the most to the decline, falling 3.3 percent. Fcmb Group Plc decreased 9.7 percent, the biggest loss. MAY & Baker Nigeria Plc rose 4.9 percent,…

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UBS Chairman Weber Sees `Massive’ Potential Drop in Bitcoin

UBS Chairman Weber Sees `Massive’ Potential Drop in Bitcoin

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – UBS Group AG Chairman Axel Weber said the Swiss bank won’t trade Bitcoin or offer it to retail clients as increased regulation could lead to a “massive” drop in value. “This is something where the price is really unclear,” Weber said in an interview Wednesday with Bloomberg TV at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “We fear that in the future if these investments implode and the market corrects, then…

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Nigeria May Cut Interest Rates Before July, Emefiele Says

Nigeria May Cut Interest Rates Before July, Emefiele Says

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Nigeria’s central bank could start cutting interest rates in the first half of the year as inflation eases, Governor Godwin Emefiele said. Once inflation gets to low double digits “and high single digit happens, then it should be easy for MPC to begin to look at easing,” Emefiele said Wednesday in an interview at his office in Abuja, the capital. “I want to think that between the end of the first…

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Morocco Seeks to Defeat U.S. With Fifth Soccer World Cup Bid

Morocco Seeks to Defeat U.S. With Fifth Soccer World Cup Bid

CASABLANCA (Capital Markets in Africa) – It has campaigned unsuccessfully four times before and is the sole challenger to a formidable joint bid by the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Yet Morocco still believes it has a shot at hosting the 2026 soccer World Cup. At the campaign’s launch in Casablanca on Tuesday, Moroccan officials argued the country was located in a more convenient time zone for the majority of fans, while pledging not to exploit…

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U.S. Offers Mozambique Help as Attacks Roil Gas-Rich North

U.S. Offers Mozambique Help as Attacks Roil Gas-Rich North

MAPUTO (Capital Markets in Africa) – The U.S. government is offering Mozambique help to end fatal attacks by suspected militants in the gas-rich Cabo Delgado region, the top American diplomat in the country said. Police have arrested more than 300 people since October after raids in Mocimboa da Praia in the country’s northeast, the first of which targeted police stations and the government blamed on a “radical Islamic sect.” Sporadic attacks have continued, including this month on…

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Mnangagwa Urges Zimbabwe to Move on From Ndebele Massacres

Mnangagwa Urges Zimbabwe to Move on From Ndebele Massacres

HARARE (Capital Markets in Africa) – Zimbabwe’s new president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, is urging the southern African nation to put behind it one of its most painful episodes: the army’s massacre of as many as 20,000 people from the minority Ndebele ethnic group in the 1980s. Mnangagwa, who replaced Robert Mugabe as president in November, was minister of state security at the time of the killings that started in 1983, three years after independence from the U.K. Opposition leaders,…

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