Features

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – A growing number of companies invest in Bitcoin but none to the extent of MicroStrategy Inc., which in 2021 announced that buying and holding the volatile digital asset was a core business strategy. The rare prominence of Bitcoin in the enterprise software company’s mission and the size of its holdings put the Tysons Corner, Va.-based business in a class of its own. That distinction led to the SEC singling…

BURKINA FASO (Capital Markets in Africa) – Soldiers in Burkina Faso said they removed President Roch Marc Christian Kabore from power in the gold-producing West African nation, a putsch that drew condemnation from the United Nations and the U.S. The military takeover was necessary because Kabore was unable to tackle insecurity “that threatens the very foundation of our nation,” according to a statement signed by Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba and read by another officer on…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – The U.K.’s fast-approaching cost-of-living crisis is already making Britons worry about their budgets, setting up a rocky 2022 for households and businesses still reeling from the impact of the pandemic. Many people are particularly worried by both their personal finances and the general economic situation, making them reluctant to splash out on big purchases, according to a closely watched survey of consumer confidence released on Friday. Meanwhile, the arrival of the…

FREE TOWN (Capital Markets in Africa) – From a distance, Kroo Bay, a slum in Sierra Leone’s capital of Freetown, resembles a gigantic overheating engine: Thousands of rust-colored tin shacks stand in rows under the sweltering West African sun, divided only by trash-filled streams of sewage. “It’s warm, warm, warm,” says Mariama Barrie, a 34-year-old mother of three who rents a one-room hut in the heart of the poverty-stricken district. “It feels like we’re being cooked…

ADISS ABABA (Capital Markets in Africa) – At least 143 people have been killed and 213 wounded in air strikes in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region since October last year, according to aid agencies. Civil war has been raging in Ethiopia for the past 14 months, pitting Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s federal forces against dissident troops loyal to the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front. The conflict has swung in Abiy’s favor over recent weeks, with the Tigrayans retreating…

Health Secretary Sajid Javid declined to rule out stronger U.K. Covid-19 rules before Christmas after the nation’s top health advisers urged greater limits to contain infections they estimate are running in the hundreds of thousands per day.  “It’s time to be more cautious: we know this thing is spreading more rapidly,” Javid told BBC News on Sunday.When asked whether he could guarantee a so-called circuit-breaker lockdown wouldn’t be imposed within days, he replied: “There are…