Features

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he disagreed with the ruling of the country’s highest court that he broke the law by suspending Parliament for five weeks in the run-up to his Oct. 31 Brexit deadline. In an unprecedented and sweeping rebuke to the premier, the Supreme Court’s 11 judges found Johnson had given Queen Elizabeth II “unlawful” advice to suspend the legislature — and that his decision had wrecked the…

NEW YORK (Capital Markets in Africa) – Rick Stone, a former partner at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, see treacherous times ahead for family offices trying to deploy cash. The head of Stone Family Office said he doubts the bond market will provide any real return over the next decade, that equity markets will suffer a substantial drop and then be flat, and that too much venture capital and private equity money will continue to chase…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – U.K. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is struggling to keep his party together as senior members demand an unambiguous commitment to staying in the European Union before a general election expected in the fall. Corbyn said his party is pledging to hold a second referendum on Brexit if it’s elected to government, pitting ‘Remain’ against a “credible” deal he negotiates with the EU — but he wouldn’t say which side he’d campaign…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – The U.K.’s opposition Labour Party said it’s already drafted laws to nationalize water and energy utilities as the prospect of a general election looms. Taking control of energy transmission and distribution networks as well as water companies will help bring down bills for consumers and allow the government to pursue a strategy to curb greenhouse gas emissions, Rebecca Long-Bailey, the party’s business spokeswoman, said on Sunday. “We’ve got the legislation…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – The white-haired Supreme Court judge leaned forward with a stern look, interrupting a lawyer who argued that Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s suspension of Parliament was unlawful. Justice Nicholas Wilson was miffed at Ronan Lavery for describing the Brexit risks to peace in Northern Ireland. That exposed the decade-old court to an accusation it’s been at pains to disprove: that it has become a player in the U.K.’s political arena. Played…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – Boris Johnson will start a week of intense diplomacy on Monday, as he tries to push for a Brexit deal on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. The British prime minister will hold meetings this week with all the key players — Germany’s Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar and European Council President Donald Tusk. He will try to persuade them to renegotiate the divorce…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – Could Boris Johnson break the Brexit impasse by binding Northern Ireland — rather than all of the U.K. as pushed by his predecessor — closely to the European Union until another arrangement was reached? On one hand, Johnson has ruled it out. On the other hand, he’s floated the idea of an all-Irish food zone as a way of avoiding checks along the frontier between Ireland, which is part of the…