Features

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – A South African court ruled that Old Mutual Ltd. doesn’t have to give fired Chief Executive Officer Peter Moyo his job back, clearing the way for the insurer to find a replacement. The stock rose. The High Court in Johannesburg on Tuesday upheld an appeal by the 175-year-old insurer against a judgment delivered in July last year to temporarily reinstate the CEO. “It confirms that Old Mutual acted properly,” spokeswoman Tabby…

ADDIS ABABA (Capital Markets in Africa) – Ethiopia’s prime minister asked South Africa’s president to intervene in the Nile dam deadlock between Egypt and his country.   The three countries and neighboring Sudan are being hosted by the U.S. Treasury for negotiations in Washington on Monday.   Last week Ethiopia said broader talks had reached a deadlock following Egypt’s introduction of new proposals to fill the dam in 12 to 21 years.   “We are willing to…

TRIPOLI (Capital Markets in Africa) – Libya’s feuding leaders are holding talks in Moscow on Monday to sign a more lasting truce agreement after Russia and Turkey seized the initiative to try to end a conflict that was rapidly devolving into a proxy war. The country’s United Nations-backed prime minister, Fayez al-Sarraj, and eastern military commander Khalifa Haftar are at the negotiations held under the auspices of the foreign and defense ministers of Russia and…

LONDON (Capital Market in Africa) – What’s behind the ongoing move from globalization to localization? Continued automation, national security concerns, nationalist political pressures, tariff walls, and diminished tax arbitrage, recovering the tacit/embedded knowledge in outsourced supply chains, the heavy carbon footprint of traded goods/services, flattening transport costs, the reduced provision of trade finance, and the tendency of aging societies to consume services. The “trade/tech war” only exacerbates this trend. 1) We think EMs – the…

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa): The African Continental Free Trade Area agreement (AfCFTA) will constitute the world’s largest free trade area, consolidating an integrated market of 1.3 billion consumers with a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of approximately $3.4 trillion.  The objective is to realise a continent-wide single market for goods and services with free movement of business, persons and investments. The AfCFTA envisions to expand intra-African trade and intensify regional integration by successively eliminating…

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – U.K. fraud prosecutors sought an Israeli billionaire’s correspondence with the former President of Democratic Republic of Congo Joseph Kabila as part of one of their largest bribery investigations, a lawyer for the Serious Fraud Office said at a London trial. SFO attorney Jonathan Hall described the request at the start of the two-day trial against Anna Machkevitch, 37, who’s accused of failing to produce the documents concerning her mining magnate father, Alexander….

January 9, 2020 – Ziraat Participation Bank in Sudan, a unit affiliated to Ziraat Katilim Bankasi and Ziraat Finans Group, one of largest banking groups in Turkey operating on both Islamic and conventional platforms, has taken the big leap to implement Path Solutions’ multi-award winning iMAL Islamic core banking platform. The scope of work includes the implementation of a number of iMAL solutions including Murabaha, Musharaka, Mudaraba, Ijara, Istisnaa, Salam, Qard Hasan, time deposit, profit…