The Editorial Team

Covid Variants Risk Rises in S. Africa With Biggest HIV Epidemic

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa): The world’s biggest number of HIV cases is complicating South Africa’s efforts to fight the coronavirus pandemic, raising the risk of more mutated versions emerging and spreading across the globe.Many of the country’s 8.2 million HIV-infected people are immuno-compromised and scientists say they can harbor the coronavirus for longer, allowing it to mutate as it reproduces. A study of an HIV positive 36-year-old woman showed that Covid-19 stayed in her…

African Central Banks Seen Holding Rates on GDP Growth Concerns

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LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Central bankers in eight key African countries are likely to leave borrowing costs unchanged this month to support the recovery of economies that remain vulnerable to coronavirus-induced shocks. Parts of the continent are wrestling with a third wave of infections driven by the highly transmissible delta variant. Africa is the world’s least-vaccinated region with only 3.2% of 1.2 billion people fully immunized, leaving it vulnerable to new waves and stricter lockdown…

Debt May Complicate Reform of Nigerian State Oil Firm, FSDH Says

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LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) -The Nigerian state-owned energy company’s debt burden will become “a political hot potato” when the firm is overhauled under new legislation, FSDH Capital Ltd said. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corp.’s current liabilities exceed its assets by 4.56 trillion naira ($11.1 billion), according to its 2020 financial statements. President Muhammadu Buhari last month signed a law that aims to transform the energy industry in Africa’s biggest oil producer, including replacing the NNPC with…

South Africa’s Green Energy Push Hinges on $28 Billion Debt Fix

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africsa) – The head of South Africa’s state power utility needs to substantially reduce its 402 billion rand ($28 billion) of debt to realize his vision of transforming the coal-addicted behemoth into a leading green-energy producer and create as many as 300,000 jobs in the process. Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. supplies more than 90% of the nation’s electricity, the bulk of it from coal, and emits more than two-fifths of the nation’s…

A Crack Opens in the Foundation of the App Store Economy

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LAGOS (Capital Martkets in Africa) – When Apple Inc. introduced its App Store in 2008, the company’s founder and chief executive Steve Jobshad a message for iPhone app developers. “We are not trying to be business partners,” he told the New York Times. Jobs meant that developers didn’t have to feel threatened because Apple’s main business was selling phones, not taking 30% commissions on app sales. But the comment could be interpreted very differently today,…

Barclays to Deutsche Bank Dubbed Climate-Change Hypocrites

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LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – Barclays Plc and Deutsche Bank AG are among 17 banks accused by climate law activists of “hypocrisy” over work related to a controversial North Sea oil field. ClientEarth, a London-based group of lawyers that brings environmental cases, wrote to the lenders asking them to justify financial or advisory services that they provide to Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Siccar Point Energy, the two firms behind the Cambo oil field project, according to…

Biden’s Allies Shy From Taxing Rich, Eroding Inequality Promise

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NEW YORK (Capital Markets in Africa) – Joe Biden’s push to ramp up taxes on the wealthy is getting diluted by his Democratic allies in Congress, undermining the president’s chances of fully delivering on his 2020 campaign pledge to curb America’s widening inequality. A blueprint that the House Ways and Means Committee will begin voting on Tuesday, prepared by Democratic members and staff of the panel, scaled back some of the most ambitious elements of…

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