Finance

LUSAKA (Capital Markets in Africa) — Zambia’s request for emergency coronavirus funding from the International Monetary Fund may be scuppered because of the southern African nation’s growing debt burden. The Washington-based lender last year cautioned that the nation’s borrowing was on an unsustainable path. And now, even as the fund makes as much as $100 billion available to member countries, the IMF warned it won’t lend money to governments if it’s not sure it will…

CAIRO (Capital Markets in Africa) — Egypt’s funding needs will probably prove decisive for the central bank, ensuring a longer pause in interest rates after a record cut in March. The focus at the moment is on bridging a financing gap that’s estimated at about $10 billion in 2020 by EFG Hermes and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Elevated rates are an advantage at a time many emerging nations are looking to stave off outflows amid…

ACCRA (Capital Markets in Africa) — A 21-day lockdown of Ghana’s biggest cities became financially unbearable for most of the population, a concern that gave the government little choice when it lifted the restrictions last month, said Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta. Ghana, which identified its first two coronavirus cases on March 12, was the first in sub-Saharan Africa to ease movement restrictions after ramping up its testing capacity. With at least 160,000 people tested, more…

CAIRO (Capital Markets in Africa) — The International Monetary Fund approved $2.77 billion in emergency funding for Egypt as the Arab world’s most populous nation grapples with the economic fallout of the coronavirus pandemic. The borrowing under the lender’s Rapid Financing Instrument comes after Egypt last month requested it and a stand-by agreement to help cover any current-account gaps. “Egypt achieved a remarkable turnaround prior to the COVID-19 shock, carrying out a successful economic reform program supported…

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) — Anheuser-Busch InBev NV received the go-ahead from the South African government to transport drinks from manufacturing plants to depots, avoiding the need to dump millions of liters of beer and saving the government 500 million rand ($27 million) in lost taxes. South Africa has banned the sale and movement of alcoholic drinks as part of measures to contain the coronavirus, and the restriction was kept in place even after…

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) — When African ministers held a video conference call to discuss debt relief last week, the same concern kept cropping up: how to cut the payments without jeopardizing future access to markets. One African Finance Minister, who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of negotiations, said creditors may victimize his country if he is too vocal about a waiver in public. Benin’s Finance Minister Romuald Wadagni has argued the…

NAIROBI (Capital Markets in Africa) — Halfway through Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta’s second term his pledge of transforming the economy through manufacturing, farming, health care, and low-cost housing has been slow to show results, and the coronavirus pandemic could now reduce that too little more than an election promise. The virus is hitting revenue collection as key drivers such as agriculture, tourism, and diaspora remittances decline, and debt costs rise for East Africa’s biggest economy….