Finance

HARARE (Capital Markets in Africa) – Karo Resources, a company linked to mining entrepreneur Loucas Pouroulis, will spend $4.2 billion on a Zimbabwean platinum project in the first big investment since President Robert Mugabe’s ousting in November. The deal is the largest to date in Zimbabwe’s mining industry, Mines Minister Winston Chitando said. President Emmerson Mnangagwa has declared the “country open for business” as he seeks to revive the economy and attract investment.  “It is not business as usual anymore,”…

SOUTH SUDAN (Capital Markets in Africa) – South Sudan will raise oil production by 30 percent when output resumes “soon” at a field damaged by conflict four years ago, Petroleum Minister Ezekiel Lul Gatkuoth said. Greater Pioneer Operating Co. will initially pump about 40,000 barrels per day, raising national output to about 175,000 barrels, Gatkuoth said in response to questions sent by Facebook Messenger on Thursday. GPOC’s owners include China National Petroleum Corp., Malaysia’s Petroliam National…

LUSAKA (Capital Markets in Africa)- Zambian President Edgar Lungu wants his tax authority and First Quantum Minerals Ltd. to speedily resolve a disputed $7.9 billion tax bill the copper producer received this week, his spokesman said. Shares in the Vancouver-based company gained. “It’s a policy of government not to interfere with independent assessments made by the tax authority,” Amos Chanda said by phone Wednesday from the capital, Lusaka. “All we do is to encourage quick negotiation of the…

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Nine years and one revolution after agreeing to manage more than $620 million of Libyan funds, a London banker is in court fighting the firm he founded, and defending fees he used for a lifestyle that included a 165,000-pound ($232,000) stay at a five-star hotel in the British capital. Frederic Marino is accused by FM Capital Partners of taking more than $16 million in secret commissions between 2009 and 2014, seeking and…

DJIBOUTI (Capital Markets in Africa) – Djibouti’s government will embrace greater Chinese involvement in the nation’s ports and sees no reasons for U.S. concern that its strategic interests may be threatened, Finance Minister Ilyas Dawaleh said. Situated on a global shipping choke-point that links the Red Sea and Suez Canal, Djibouti has become increasingly important to regional and world powers. Smaller than the state of Massachusetts, it hosts the largest U.S. military base in Africa and China’s…

KINSHASA (Capital Markets in Africa) – Anthony Milewski was among the first investors to realize that if electric-vehicle sales take off the way automakers expect, the world is going to need a lot more cobalt—an essential ingredient in lithium-ion batteries. But the market for cobalt isn’t very big, and there aren’t many easy ways for investors to bet on prices. The metal is a minor by-product of copper and nickel mining, and only a few places produce meaningful quantities. More than…