|
Tuesday 07th of February 2017 |
Morning, Africa |
Register and its all Free.
If you are tracking the NSE Do it via RICHLIVE and use Mozilla Firefox as your Browser. 0930-1500 KENYA TIME Normal Board - The Whole shebang Prompt Board Next day settlement Expert Board All you need re an Individual stock.
The Latest Daily PodCast can be found here on the Front Page of the site http://www.rich.co.ke
very much looking forward to hosting H.E. John Dramani Mahama, FormerPresident of the Republic of Ghana (2012- 2017) at #Mindspeak ThisSaturday |
read more |
|
Overseas Chinese acquisitions worth $75bn cancelled last year @FT Africa |
Chinese overseas deals worth almost $75bn were cancelled last year as a regulatory clampdown and restrictions on foreign exchange caused 30 acquisitions with European and US groups to fall through.
The figures, which reveal a sevenfold rise in the value of cancelled deals from about $10bn in 2015, highlight a waning appetite for global dealmaking by the world’s second-largest economy. But despite more deals being abandoned, the analysis by law firm Baker McKenzie and researcher Rhodium shows that Chinese direct investment into the US and Europe still more than doubled to a record $94.2bn in 2016.
|
read more |
|
@Kipto0 Tao Africa |
“People who dream when they sleep at night know of a special kind of happiness which the world of the day holds not, a placid ecstasy, and ease of heart, that are like honey on the tongue. They also know that the real glory of dreams lies in their atmosphere of unlimited freedom. It is not the freedom of the dictator, who enforces his own will on the world, but the freedom of the artist, who has no will, who is free of will. The pleasure of the true dreamer does not lie in the substance of the dream, but in this: that there things happen without any interference from his side, and altogether outside his control. Great landscapes create themselves, long splendid views, rich and delicate colours, roads, houses, which he has never seen or heard of...” ― Karen Blixen, Out of Africa
|
read more |
|
How to ask for what you want - and get it every time Start with please and thank you, then spoon on the flattery @FT Africa |
I know a woman who can get people to do whatever she wants. She can make busy executives give her their evenings, their thoughts and their money. On various occasions she has persuaded me to do things for her, just as she has enlisted thousands of others.
I ran into her the other day and asked what her secret was. “It is not hard,” she said. “I just say please and thank you.”
Actually it is not quite as simple as that. Most people know how to say please and thank you — or think they do. Almost everyone was taught that before they went to primary school. But hardly anyone has been taught how to do it properly.
Consider the following perfectly polite email I received recently from a man I know slightly. It began: “This year we are partnering with XXX to launch the second annual YYY conference. I know you are busy but we would love you to host a session on women in business on the Saturday.”
It then went on at length about the theme of the year and offered a link to a video of the previous year’s event. “Do let me know if that is feasible,” it ended.
There is no danger of ever laying it on too thick. There is no level at which flattery stops working, according to a study by Jennifer Chatman of the University of California, Berkeley.
|
read more |
|
Made in Africa - the future of production on the continent United Nations University Africa |
For more than 40 years Africa’s industrial development has been disappointing. In 2013 the average share of manufacturing in GDP in sub-Saharan Africa was about 10% – the same as in the 1970s. Africa’s share of global manufacturing has fallen from about 3% in 1970 to less than 2% in 2013. Manufacturing output per person is about a third of the average for all developing countries and manufactured exports per person, a key measure of success in global markets, are about 10% of the global average for low-income countries. Clearly, Africa needs more industry to create more good jobs.
|
read more |
|
Zimbabwe has started circulating a $5 'bond note', the central bank said Africa |
The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) on Thursday released the purple $5 note to banks, its governor John Mangudya said.
He said $15 million of the new notes had been released, bringing the total amount of bond notes in circulation to $88 million. Zimbabwe abandoned its own hyperinflation-hit currency in 2009 in favour of the US dollar, but a widening trade deficit, lack of foreign investment and a decline in remittances by Zimbabweans abroad have helped to fuel foreign currency shortages.
|
read more |
|
'Death Spiral' Looms for Zimbabwe Economy as Cash Runs Out Bloomberg Africa |
Zimbabwe’s crippling cash shortage has left a black hole in the financial system that’s crushing the rest of the economy.
“We deposit the cash and it becomes theoretical, ephemeral,” Mohamed Salam, who owns several small stores selling building supplies in Harare, the capital, said in an interview. “My bank balance says it’s there, but it isn’t. I can make payments electronically to local suppliers, but I can’t pay foreign suppliers.”
The liquidity squeeze has left companies unable to pay their workers in cash and foreign suppliers, driving many out of business, and added to the ranks of more than 3 million people who’ve become economic exiles. The economy probably shrank 0.3 percent last year and is set to contract 2.5 percent this year, according to the International Monetary Fund.
While the Reserve Bank estimates about $4 billion is circulating in the economy, Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries President Busisa Moyo says the amount may be as little as $100 million.
“The economy is in what could turn into a death spiral,” Steve Hanke, a professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore who studied the advent of hyperinflation in Zimbabwe, said in an e-mailed response to questions. He blamed the government of President Robert Mugabe, 92, for being “so incompetent and corrupt and prone to making bad economic policies.”
“The country has run out of money and we have completely lost the ability to pay for imports,” said John Robertson, an independent economist in Harare. “This comes against a backdrop of falling productivity as companies fail to access vital inputs because there’s no foreign currency to pay for them. As long as government continues to do things that discourage both local and foreign investment into the productive sector, the situation can only get worse.”
In a bid to ease the banknote shortage and discourage cash hoarding, the government began distributing so-called bond notes in November, with about $88 million of the dollar-linked securities issued so far out of a planned $200 million that are backed by a loan from the African Export-Import Bank. While banks and most large retailers accept the proxy currency, many small stores, informal traders and taxi drivers won’t, or price them at as little as 70 percent of their dollar face value.
“Zimbabwe is no longer a pure dollarized system, but a mixed system, one that is bound to fail,” he said. “More bond notes will only add fuel to the demand for hoarding of what is viewed as being the superior currency and store of value in Zimbabwe, the U.S. dollar. As the issuance of bond notes increases in response to the hoarding frenzy, the premium on dollar notes to bond notes will widen and so will the distortions in the economy.”
|
read more |
|
Fairfax Said to Raise About $500 Million for New Africa Fund Africa |
The Toronto-based insurer sought to raise as much as $1 billion at $10 a share for Fairfax Africa Holdings Corp. in an initial public offering on the Toronto Stock Exchange, according to a regulatory filing in December. Fairfax said it had secured as much as $416 million in commitments for the African venture from both its own funds and partners, including the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System, a Canadian pension fund and CI Investments Inc., according to the filing.
|
read more |
|
Kenyan private sector growth indices flat as credit crunch persists @BD_Africa Africa |
According to the Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) survey released by Stanbic Bank and HIS Markit on Monday, the private sector growth improved slightly, underpinned by a sharp expansion in new work, which was supported by a steep increase in new export orders.
The survey shows firms raised payroll numbers slightly while there were signs of ongoing pressure on operating capacity. The seasonally adjusted index stood at 52, as output increased at a modest pace, compared to December’s 54.1 points.
On the price front, it rose for the fourth successive month amid a further increase in input costs.
“In fact, since the legislation to cap interest rates came into effect in September 2016, we can now see signs of distress within the private sector as presented by lament about cash shortages,” said Jibran Qureishi, regional economist East Africa at Stanbic Bank.
“A further slowdown in private sector credit growth and poor weather conditions will most likely lead to a downward trend in the PMI over the coming quarter, more so as costs for firms will most probably rise.”
According to a separate poll, however, business sentiment in Kenya fell in January, pointing to a relatively soft start to the year.
The Standard Chartered-MNI Business Sentiment Indicator (BSI) fell 4.5 per cent month-on-month to 59.6, leaving it down 6.8 per cent year-on-year. Four of the five components of the headline indicator dropped as companies reported slower activity, said the poll.
Of the five components of the headline indicator, four — new orders, production, employment and supplier delivery times which together account for 85 per cent of the headline indicator — fell. Only order backlogs increased.
Companies reported slower production and demand in January: production fell by 9.9 per cent month on month while productive capacity dropped 3.4 per cent.
Connecting the dots, food prices, the weather and Laikipia @thestarkenya http://www.rich.co.ke/media/docs/PX_014NSX0602.pdf
|
read more |
|
The responsible way to own a piece of Kenyan wilderness @FT Africa |
Il Ngwesi is a pioneering example of the sweat equity option. It is a Maasai-owned-and-run eco lodge with the now familiar trappings of wealthy people getting away from it all: rustic furniture, mud-wall type construction and an unfussy approach to household management. It lets rooms at $345 per person per night, all inclusive apart from alcohol. Il Ngwesi represents the kind of community tourism investment model that could be replicated. Investors may see returns in 15 to 30 years dependent on occupancy rates, according to Will Jones, my guide for this trip. He is an east African tourism expert involved in Kenya’s conservancy work who is attempting to roll out the model across northern Kenya by creating an impact investment vehicle, Wild Philanthropy.
Il Ngwesi’s foundation depended on trust and mutual benefit between Olekinyaga’s community and neighbouring landowner and conservationist Ian Craig who suggested forming a conservancy and tourist lodge. Michael Dyer, Craig’s cousin and a landowner who has helped set up a number of community-owned conservancies, was also heavily involved and helped bring in the main funding from the Liz Claiborne Art Ortenberg Foundation.
“Ian Craig brought the idea to my dad in ’94 to ’96,” says Olekinyaga. “They were the same age and they had grown up together. The community was suspicious because of the colonial history and said, ‘If you want to build a lodge, go and build it on your land’. But Ian Craig took us round the country to lots of meetings and raised money from the EU, US and the Kenya Wildlife Service to build the lodge. Finally the elders came together for a meeting under the acacia tree. It was a difficult decision but we agreed to go ahead.”
Some landowners, such as Dyer, run a “livestock-to-market” programme, which helps local people by fattening community-owned livestock. When I visited Borana, Dyer’s estate in the Kenyan highlands, some of Olekinyaga’s community livestock were grazing there as part of the programme.
“Ah, but that is because Borana is a rare success story,” says Jones.
|
read more |
|
ISS Today: Kenya's opposition needs more than a coalition to win the polls Daily Maverick Africa |
In elections the world over, the odds are usually stacked against opposition parties. One way to improve those odds is for opposition parties to present a united front. But for this approach to work in Kenya as it did in 2002, the parties involved – and their ambitious leaders – have to realise that simply forming a coalition is not enough. Without a credible leader, a clear strategy, and an inspirational message – and with only just seven months to go until voting day – Nasa risks handing the election victory to the Jubilee Party on a platter
Conclusions
They need to unite and unite behind a figure like Adama Barrow.
|
read more |
|
|
|
|