Banking

Moroccan Central Bank keeps benchmark interest rate unchanged at 2,25%

Posted on by The Editorial Team
Moroccan Central Bank keeps benchmark interest rate unchanged at 2,25%

RABAT (Capital Markets in Africa) – Morocco’s central bank said on Tuesday economic growth would jump to 4.2 percent next year from an estimated 1.2 percent in 2016 on the back of sharply rising agricultural output. It made the bullish projections as it kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged at 2.25 percent. Abnormally dry weather across North Africa slashed the cereal harvest last season to 3.35 million tonnes, down 70 percent from the previous record…

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Mozambique Says Tight Monetary Policy Is Starting to Bear Fruit

Posted on by The Editorial Team
Mozambique Says Tight Monetary Policy Is Starting to Bear Fruit

MAPUTO (Capital Markets in Africa) -Mozambique’s metical is stabilizing and the inflation rate is forecast to drop after an aggressive rate hike by the central bank in October, according to Governor Rogerio Zandamela. “The most recent information reported in the last quarter of the year is more encouraging,” Zandamela told reporters Monday in the capital, Maputo. “We noted that monetary adjustment has begun to produce the desired effects.” Inflation, which accelerated to 26.8 percent in November,…

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Big Banks $70 Billion Short in Fed Push to Prevent Bailouts

Posted on by The Editorial Team
Big Banks $70 Billion Short in Fed Push to Prevent Bailouts

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – Wall Street banks are about $70 billion short in building up funds the Federal Reserve says they’ll need to tap following a collapse, down by almost half from the central bank’s earlier estimates. The eight biggest U.S. financial firms are required to build cushions of long-term debt that can be transformed into equity in a new company if the old one fails, according to a rule the Fed governors approved Thursday….

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Angola’s Access to Dollars Dries Up as Foreign Banks Halt Supply

Posted on by The Editorial Team
Angola’s Access to Dollars Dries Up as Foreign Banks Halt Supply

LUANDA (Capital Markets in Africa) – All foreign banks have stopped providing dollar clearing in Angola, which vies with Nigeria as Africa’s largest crude oil producer, according to court papers filed in South Africa by Standard Bank Group Ltd. A single European bank that had been providing the service, which wasn’t identified in the submission, has pulled out of the country, Standard Bank said in the documents, which were submitted to the Pretoria High Court on Wednesday. The…

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Mozambique Holds Key Interest Rate as Inflation Seen Peaking

Posted on by The Editorial Team
Mozambique Holds Key Interest Rate as Inflation Seen Peaking

MAPUTO (Capital Markets in Africa) – Mozambique’s central bank held its key lending rate, with inflation expected to peak as the debt-distressed nation’s currency stabilizes. The Monetary Policy Committee kept the benchmark rate at 23.25 percent, Governor Rogerio Zandamela told reporters Wednesday in the capital, Maputo.Banco de Mocambique has raised the monetary policy rate by a total 13.5 percentage points in past meetings this year to try stem spiraling consumer prices in the coal-producing country. Consumer prices have…

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Botswana’s central bank keeps Bank rate unchanged at 5.5 percent

Posted on by The Editorial Team
Botswana’s central bank keeps Bank rate unchanged at 5.5 percent

GABORONE (Capital Markets in Africa) – The Bank of Botswana Bank Rate was maintained at 5.5 percent at the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting held on December 13, 2016. This was in view of the positive outlook for price stability, with inflation forecast to be within the Bank’s 3 – 6 percent medium-term objective range. The Bank stated that the current state of the economy and both the domestic and external economic outlook, including the…

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Banking Stocks Surprise Wrongfoots South African Money Managers

Posted on by The Editorial Team
Banking Stocks Surprise Wrongfoots South African Money Managers

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – Over-defensive South African money managers who have missed their performance benchmarks this year would be better positioned had they read signals that banking stocks were showing greater resilience than expected, according to Richard Schellbach, the equity strategist at Citigroup Inc. This time last year, the outlook for South Africa was starkly different, with the threat of economic recession looming, Schellbach said in an interview in Johannesburg. “But at the end of the…

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