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Leaders of the world's wealthiest economies are in Japan to discuss
the biggest challenges to global free trade.
The group of 20 summit, or G20, has been held every year for the past
two decades.
This year's summit in Osaka is supposed to unite leaders around issues
such as free trade and climate change.
But political tensions and the trade war between the United States and
China are creating divisions.
Can the participants find consensus? And how relevant is this meeting
for the rest of the world?

Presenter: Divya Gopalan
Guests:
Felicitas Weber - project lead at the Business and Human Rights
Resource Centre  @FelWeber
John Kirton - director of the G20 Research Group, an independent
network of global scholars providing analysis on the G20 @jjkirton
Aly-Khan Satchu - economist and CEO of Rich Management

Macro Thoughts

Home Thoughts

“Happiness is in the quiet, ordinary things. A table, a chair, a book
with a paper-knife stuck between the pages. And the petal falling from
the rose, and the light flickering as we sit silent.”  ― Virginia
Woolf, The Waves

The fishermen travel to different fishing spots along the lakefront
and then bring their catch to the local community fishmonger, says
Alfred Banda, an outreach worker with Youth Net Counseling in Malawi's
Zomba district. If they have the virus, they can bring it into a
community, or if they become infected in the course of their travels
"they will transmit," Banda says. "The more mobile they are, the more
they endanger the health of others."
In Malawi, approximately 1 in 10 adults ages 15 to 64 is HIV-positive,
according to UNAIDS — one of the highest rates in the world
When the women had their own boats, "that really flipped the economic
dynamic," Higdon says. They were in charge.

Most fishermen then head to Lake Malawi, where there is fishing year-round.

It is the fourth largest fresh water lake in the world by volume, the
ninth largest lake in the world by area—and the third largest and
second deepest lake in Africa. Lake Malawi is home to more species of
fish than any other lake,[6] including at least 700 species of
cichlids.[7] The Mozambique portion of the lake was officially
declared a reserve by the Government of Mozambique on June 10,
2011,[8] while in Malawi a portion of the lake is included in Lake
Malawi National Park.[6] Lake Malawi is a meromictic lake, meaning
that its water layers do not mix. The permanent stratification of Lake
Malawi's water and the oxic-anoxic boundary (relating to oxygen in the
water) are maintained by moderately small chemical and thermal
gradients.[9] Lake Malawi is between 560 kilometres (350 mi)[1] and
580 kilometres (360 mi) long,[2] and about 75 kilometres (47 mi) wide
at its widest point. The lake has a total surface area of about 29,600
square kilometres (11,400 sq mi).[1] The lake is 706 m (2,316 ft) at
its deepest point, located in a major depression in the north-central
part.[10]

A fisherman holds up a chambo — what locals call a type of tilapia
native to Lake Malawi. Chambo is one of Malawi's most popular fish.
Once it was plentiful, but now it is listed as "critically endangered"
because of overfishing.

These headline big ticket Events like the G20 which was held in Osaka
are I find simply unputdownable and a Hollywood Bollywood level
spectacle. The UK and South African Houses of Parliament are similarly
unputdownable. Returning to the G20, We had Trump and Xi going Toe to
Toe for the main course but this was preceded by Babette's Feast of
hors d'oeuvres. [South Koreans served 12 cold Korean starters on the
official menu -- among them steamed sea urchin with tofu and
mini-hamburgers. The main dish was a sirloin steak made of US beef,
accompanied by bulgogi sauce, pickled garlic leaves at a dinner for
President Trump ahead of his handshake visit to the DMZ, which I will
speak to momentarily]  Bolsanaro waited 25 minutes for Xi and then
cancelled which must be a first for the Supreme Leader. We had Daddy's
little Princess Ivanka doing her ''Disney'' thing. MBS, of course,
loomed over proceedings. Prime Minister Trudeau arrived well prepared
clutching a clunky briefcase, Tito Mboweni took Photos with Vladimir.
Theresa May did a Xi Jinping with Vladimir [Pulling a Face looking
away as if there is an assault happening on your olfactory senses at
the very moment the Photo is taken]. Trump has now found a way of
deflecting the prima facie charge of Russian interference in the 2016
Election and it is the equivalent of

''You Bad Bad Boy Vlad. Don't do it again, you hear.'' or words to that effect.

And I thought I noticed Vladimir was quite impressed with the role
play and the ''political'' subtlety around the Trump side step.

The Big Issues were Climate Change [Macron had made this his red
line], longevity and the Digital Economy but of course the Big Set
Piece Event was Saturdays Trump Xi Sit Down. President Xi Jinping
played his hand with extreme courtesy finesse and some old fashioned
etiquette seeking out Trump the day before at the Official Photo
session. This was a subtle triangulation move.

The Read Out was as follows.

President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart, Donald Trump, agree to
restart China-US #Trade consultations. @ChinaDaily
“We’re right back on track and we’ll see what happens,” U.S. President
Donald Trump told reporters Reuters
The 80-minute meeting with Xi was “excellent, as good as it was going
to be,” Trump added.
“Cooperation and dialogue are better than friction and confrontation,” Xi said.
Trump responded that a fair trade deal with China would be “historic”
and he hoped “We can go on to do something that truly will be
monumental and great for both countries.”
"Let's wait and Xi" said Citibank.
''A lot of people are drawing a lot of unwarranted conclusions about
the course of the US-China relationship based on a meeting, which
probably didn’t resolve very much, and a press conference with a guy
who is liable to say anything and completely reverse it a day later''
said @prchovanec

Marco Rubio tweeted ''If President Trump has agreed to reverse recent
sanctions against #Huawei he has made a catastrophic mistake'' which
speaks to my first overarching Point that being President Trump is not
the ''Decider'' in this matter. What we have witnessed is good Theatre
but entirely meaningless. I think both sides are making an economic
calculation. Trump wants to keep the US Economy ''blowing hot'' into
his reelection. And Xi understands that this negotiation is much more
than a ''Reality TV'' show 90 minute engagement and a Time-out will
give some respite from what is now becoming a sharp slow down with
asymmetric cliff edge downside risks . Therefore, this is a Christmas
truce (German: Weihnachtsfrieden; French: Trêve de Noël was a series
of widespread but unofficial ceasefires along the Western Front of
World War I around Christmas 1914]. However, this is 1914 and not
1918.

In the Spirit of ''Reality TV'' which of course sinks or swims on
ratings, President Trump detoured into the DMZ AND became the first
sitting US president to cross into North Korea after meeting Mr Kim at
the demilitarised zone. The Ratings were off the charts. Of course,
the Folks in Tehran must be calculating that they need to speed up
Iranium enrichment and get a proper deterrent and then they too will
be holding hands with President Trump. Trump will parlay these DMZ
Photo Ops into a major Foreign Policy success.

The markets flew higher in June. The Dow Jones Industrial Average
posted its best June since 1938! Gold blew through $1,400.00 for the
first time since 2013. Bitcoin which dropped $2,000.00 in a blink of
an eye last week remains up around +200% in 2019. Interest Rates
nose-dived specifically in the US where the market has now priced in a
halving of the FED Fund rate from 2.50% to 1.25% over the next 12
months. You might not know this but I was a Short End Trader in my
previous Career in the City of London and I made my first
reputation-making Trade at Credit Suisse First Boston all those years
ago in the Eurodollar market. And if I were back at that Desk I would
be limit Short the Eurodollar [US interest rates] market as from
Monday.

Reality will soon intrude on this Reality Show.

美国总统 #特朗普 与中国国家主席 #习近平 29号上午在日本大阪举行了会晤，特朗普与习近平在闭门会谈前分别发表了讲话。 #G20
#日本大阪 美国之音中文网 @VOAChinese
https://twitter.com/VOAChinese/status/1144823927803432960

“We’re right back on track and we’ll see what happens,” U.S. President
Donald Trump told reporters after meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping
on the sidelines of a summit of leaders of the Group of 20 (G20) in
Japan.
The 80-minute meeting with Xi was “excellent, as good as it was going
to be,” Trump added.
Xi told Trump he hoped the United States could treat Chinese companies
fairly, it added. On the issues of sovereignty and respect, China must
safeguard its core interests, Xi said.
“Cooperation and dialogue are better than friction and confrontation,” he said.
Trump responded that a fair trade deal with China would be “historic”
and he hoped “We can go on to do something that truly will be
monumental and great for both countries.”

A lot of people are drawing a lot of unwarranted conclusions about the
course of the US-China relationship based on a meeting, which probably
didn’t resolve very much, and a press conference with a guy who is
liable to say anything and completely reverse it a day later.

Ivanka Trump
Jared Kushner
Mick Mulvaney
Wilbur Ross
Mike Pompeo
Trump
Steve Mnuchin
Bob Lighthizer
John Bolton
Dan Scavino
Peter Navarro.

10-DEC-2018 :: Canada will face "grave consequences" [Xinhua: (Ch.)
严重后果] The temptation to ''mug'' the handsome Justin Trudeau is
something the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia could not resist and it
seems Xi is experiencing the same impulse
http://bit.ly/2rv1jv4

Canada will face "grave consequences" [Xinhua: (Ch.) 严重后果] if it does
not immediately release Meng Wanzhou. The Vancouver Real Estate market
which has boomed for decades on the back of Chinese demand looks
horribly exposed. The temptation to ''mug'' the handsome Justin
Trudeau is something the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia could not resist
and it seems Xi is experiencing the same impulse.

And as well as the 12 cold Korean starters on the official menu --
among them steamed sea urchin with tofu, and pan-fried mung beans --
mini-hamburgers were served, Blue House officials said.
Serving western-style food along with Korean dishes symbolised the
"collaboration and harmony" between the South and the US, Seoul's
presidential office said.
When Trump last visited in 2017, the Blue House prepared a menu
infused with "local, traditional flavour" and featuring a beef rib
dish accompanied by a gravy using a 360-year-old soy sauce.
Then, Seoul also sought to score a diplomatic point by featuring a
prawn caught in the waters off Dokdo, disputed islands controlled by
the South but claimed by Japan.

Europe announced that the special trade channel, Instex, that will
allow European firms to avoid SWIFT and bypass American sanctions on
Iran, is now operational. As a reminder, last September, in order to
maintain a financial relationship with Iran that can not be vetoed by
the US, Europe unveiled a "Special Purpose Vehicle" to bypass SWIFT.
The mechanism would facilitate transactions between European and
Iranian companies, while preventing the US from vetoing the
transactions and pursuing punitive measures on those companies and
states that defied Trump. The payment balancing system will allow
companies in Europe to buy Iranian goods, and vice-versa, without
actual money-transfers between European and Iranian banks.As a
reminder, last September, in order to maintain a financial
relationship with Iran that can not be vetoed by the US, Europe
unveiled a "Special Purpose Vehicle" to bypass SWIFT. The mechanism
would facilitate transactions between European and Iranian companies,
while preventing the US from vetoing the transactions and pursuing
punitive measures on those companies and states that defied Trump. The
payment balancing system will allow companies in Europe to buy Iranian
goods, and vice-versa, without actual money-transfers between European
and Iranian banks.

Euro 1.1351
Dollar Index 96.353
Japan Yen 108.145
Swiss Franc 0.9801
Pound 1.2690
Aussie 0.7001
India Rupee 69.9505
South Korea Won 1152.485
Brazil Real 3.8489
Egypt Pound 16.7157
South Africa Rand 14.0824

It may be a cliche, but it’s often true that markets tend to do what
causes the most amount of pain. And right now, the market is
inflicting a lot of pain on Bitcoin bears. The cryptocurrency soared
to almost $14,000 on Wednesday, bringing its gain this week already to
about 40% and drawing comparisons to the huge run-up in late 2017,
when Bitcoin prices reached almost $20,000 before crashing. Now, like
then, nobody is truly sure what is driving the gains. It could be a
bad case of FOMO (the fear of missing out) among the diehard crypto
believers. It could be tied to the announcement by Facebook that it is
developing an online payment system named Libra that the bulls say
adds credibility to the crypto movement. It could also be tied to the
growing pile of negative-yielding debt worldwide, which just topped
$12 trillion. The thinking is that if investors are looking for a
place to hide, it’s better to own an asset that isn’t exactly
correlated to any other market and doesn’t guarantee a loss like
negative-yielding debt. (That also explains gold’s rapid rise, by the
way.) The last explanation may be the best: Bitcoin is getting caught
in a huge short squeeze. Data from the Commodities Futures Trading
Commission and CME show that a record 4,431 outstanding contracts are
betting on a decline in Bitcoin. The more Bitcoin rises, the more
expensive it becomes to hold these positions. As such, reversing those
bearish bets creates demand, pushing prices even higher.

In case you hadn’t noticed, Bitcoin has made a major comeback. After
falling below $4,000 for much of 2018, the price reached almost
$14,000 earlier this week. It’s still volatile, and fell sharply later
in the week, but some Bitcoin optimists believe it will soon approach
its late-2017 high of $20,000.
The obvious question is this: If Bitcoin was just a bubble to begin
with, why has it been bouncing back in this manner? The answer is that
cryptocurrencies, in some form or another, are probably here to stay.
One reason for the rise in Bitcoin’s price may have to do with the
U.S. and China and the trade war. It no longer seems that China will
join the international economic order as that term might have been
understood 15 years ago.
Instead, there will be an ongoing cold war; China will not liberalize,
and capital controls may persist.
In that world, Bitcoin will continue to prove a useful way of getting
funds out of China.
The Chinese Communist government may or may not crack down on that
practice, but outright liberalization would have ended this use of
Bitcoin altogether.
For related reasons, a China that does not liberalize may influence
the broader tenor of the global economy away from freedom, again
giving Bitcoin additional uses around the world for evading central
authorities.
A second development is that the Democratic Party in the U.S.
continues to shift to the left, including on the possibility of a
wealth tax. As America’s fiscal deficits grow (due often to the
Republicans, I might add), there will be a long-term need to restore
fiscal sanity.
No matter what you think of this idea, it likely would boost the
demand for Bitcoin and other crypto assets, as cryptocurrencies are
potentially a way to store assets out of reach of many tax
authorities.
And the U.S. is hardly the only nation that may be looking to a wealth
tax in the future to balance the books. In essence, the new and higher
price of Bitcoin is telling us that fiscal solvency will be hard to
come by, and the wealthy will not give up their assets without a
fight.
Third, Facebook is now leading a movement to introduce a new
cryptocurrency, namely the Libra. I’m not sure Libra will be allowed
by the law to get off the ground, but still the new proposal is backed
by a pretty striking and radical innovation: the idea that transaction
costs on remittances and other fund transfers can be lowered
significantly by defining a new medium of payment, piggybacking on
older media of exchange. It would be a major advance if the current 7%
to 8% remittance fees could be lowered significantly to say 1% or 2%,
and crypto still holds this promise.
Again, you may not be convinced by what is on the table. But seeing a
major new idea in the crypto space is proving bullish for the sector
as a whole.
And now one of America’s best-known global companies is putting its
imprimatur on the proposal. Think of this as a sign that the crypto
space is still evolving.
While that means Bitcoin likely will face more competition in the
future, it lowers the chance of crypto as a sector vanishing
altogether, which was starting to look like a risk.
One final possible explanation for the resurgence of Bitcoin: Populism
is spreading, the Middle East is not calming down, and the world is
not solving its geopolitical problems.
To the extent Bitcoin is a general hedge, much like gold, the
conditions for its value seem to be favoring a high future demand for
portfolio insurance. Even a small percentage of global wealth put into
Bitcoin can sustain a high Bitcoin price.
It is missing the point to wonder if the new and higher Bitcoin price
is fully rational. In some economic models, the price of a
cryptocurrency can be whatever people think it should be.
Whether or not those models are your favored approach, a lot of people
seem to believe they are true — and they are buying cryptoassets,
including Bitcoin, accordingly.
So crypto is alive and well these days, even if (like me) you reject
the utopian predictions that it will somehow displace money as we know
it. If we have had a hard time seeing the resiliency of the crypto
space,
it is because we are not used to thinking of futures that are
radically different from the present. But those futures — for monetary
institutions at least — now seem to be closer than ever before.

The analogue concept is a foundational premise of chart analysis --
that forms tend to repeat, even in different time frames. Nasdaq 100
in 1999-2000 vs. BTC currently. Advance above 12444 violates possible
analogue $BTC

Eventually, it is revealed that Oz is actually none of these things,
but rather an ordinary conman from Omaha, Nebraska, who has been using
elaborate magic tricks and props to make himself seem “great and
powerful”.

President Trump is highly tuned to the markets and in fact something
of a c21st artiste.
His positive ‘’Trade War’’ tweets are timed around the US Market hours
and designed to soothe, massage and finesse US asset prices and he
turns more negative in Chinese trading hours.
This is next-level gaming and there are few leaders I can recall that
have appreciated the purity of the market signal and played the game
at this Yehudi Menuhin virtuouso level.
Of course, Carl Icahn has stayed real close. Trump’s tweets lulled the
markets and as Joerg Wuttke pro- nounced ‘’Xi got Trump wrong [and the
Chinese economy is ill-prepared for what comes next]’’. Xi misread the
signals.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro called off a meeting on Saturday in
Japan with Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping after his delegation was
left waiting.
While delays in meetings at multilateral summits are not unusual --
timetables often slip, and Russian President Vladimir Putin is famous
for running behind, for example -- it is less usual for a leader to
call off a chat entirely.
The meeting on the sidelines of the Group of 20 Summit in Osaka was
set to start at 2:30 pm local time. At 2:55 pm, a press officer told
reporters the meeting had been canceled.
Bolsonaro’s spokesman Otavio Rego Barros said the Brazilian delegation
had to pack its luggage at the hotel and make sure it was on time for
the presidential plane departure. “
The president decided to call off this bilateral meeting,” he said.
“The meeting was much delayed already, we were waiting in the
bilateral meeting room.”
China is Brazil’s top trading partner and invests heavily in the
country. Bolsonaro is due to visit in October.
While he spoke on the campaign trail of lessening Brazil’s economic
dependence on China, some in his administration have since sought to
mend fences.
“The Chinese can buy in Brazil, but they can’t buy Brazil,” the
president said at a breakfast with journalists in April.
Vice-President General Hamilton Mourao said in May that pragmatism was
needed for the health of Brazil’s economy.

Frontier Markets

The simultaneous slaying of the premier of the Amhara regional state,
the second most populous in the federation, and the Defence Force
Chief of Staff on 22 June was a broadside against Prime Minister Abiy
Ahmed and the federal government.

In spite of PM Abiy’s well-intended reforms, modern-day Ethiopia has
become just as much of an ethno-regionalist tinderbox as the former
Soviet Union was in the twilight years of Gorbachev’s leadership, with
the only thing missing being the spark to set the whole state ablaze.

Asaminew planned to wage Hybrid War on Ethiopia by using
Unconventional Warfare (terrorism, assassinations, bombings, etc.) to
catalyze a Color Revolution that he and his cohorts hoped would lead
to the reversal of reforms and/or regime change.

Asaminew’s coup attempt was an entirely indigenous response to PM
Abiy’s radical Gorbachev-like reforms and represents the fourth actual
or attempted military seizure of power this year after Gabon, Algeria,
and Sudan, proving that the “African Spring” continues to roll on.

He grew up in a Muslim family (Ahmed Ali, his Oromo father; Tezeta
Wolde, his mother) and with Oromo Muslim and Christian grandparents.
He is evidently a Virilian and Gladwellian Figure.

“To create one contagious movement, you often have to create many
small movements first.” “Look at the world around you. It may seem
like an immovable, implacable place. It is not, With the slightest
push—in just the right place—it can be tipped.”—Malcolm Gladwell .

I’m in Khartoum today, where the streets are filled with tens of
thousands of incredibly brave and determined pro-democracy protestors
- just 4 weeks after the massacre of 120 protestors by paramilitary
forces. They refuse to give up their demand for civilian government.

One vision played out on our screens, the protestors could have been
our wives, children. The other vision is that of MBS, MBZ and Al-Sisi
and its red in tooth and claw.

After troops launched a deadly night-time raid on Sudan’s
pro-democracy protesters, blame immediately focused on the Rapid
Support Forces. The notorious paramilitary unit, made up of remnants
of a militia that wreaked havoc in war-torn Darfur in the 2000s, had
led the June 4 assault, victims said. Demonstrators were beaten, shot
and raped. The bodies of dozens of the 100 people killed — according
to local estimates — were tossed into the Nile.
The crackdown suggested the country’s military leaders, who have ruled
since the protests triggered a coup against Omar al-Bashir in April,
were sending a deadly message that they would not bow to popular
pressure and accept a transition to civilian rule. But it was not just
the RSF and the generals who faced scrutiny: as the body count
mounted, attention intensified on their regional backers — Saudi
Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Two days after the attack, the US state department issued an unusually
curt readout of a call between a senior US official and Prince Khaled
bin Salman, the Saudi deputy defence minister and brother of Crown
Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom’s de facto leader. David Hale,
undersecretary of state for political affairs, described the crackdown
as “brutal” and told Prince Khaled of the “importance of a transition
from the Transitional Military Council to a civilian-led government”.
Nevertheless, the crackdown raised scrutiny over the countries’ role
in Sudan, while fuelling wider debate about the interventionist
polices being pursued by assertive Gulf states at a time when they are
spending hundreds of millions of dollars buying concessions to manage
ports and other infrastructure in the Horn of Africa.
“All our problems are about Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt,” says
Salman Osama, a 27-year-old surgeon who has been on the frontline of
the Sudan protests and treated wounded people during the RSF raid.
“They were supporting the [Bashir] regime that was oppressing us and
they are supporting this regime too.”
The kingdom and the UAE — its closest regional ally — have pledged
$3bn to Sudan’s Transitional Military Council since Mr Bashir was
ousted, the two joining Egypt as the generals’ most important backers.
For many protesters the Khartoum crackdown reinforced their fears that
the foreign powers were bent on keeping their regime allies in power
at the expense of democracy.
In its wake, Saudi Arabia and the UAE both called for “constructive
dialogue” among Sudanese parties. But it is the generals they appear
to be banking on to protect their interests, including Sudan’s
deployment of troops in Yemen as part of a Saudi-led coalition
fighting Iran-aligned Houthi rebels.
“The Saudis and Emiratis know Burhan and Hemeti [Lt Gen Hamdan] well
due to their command of Sudanese forces in the Yemen war,” the
International Crisis Group said in a report. “They trust the generals
to shepherd the country through a managed transition from one
military-led regime to another, avoiding the interlude that occurred
in Egypt [in 2011] — elections with uncertain outcomes followed by
brief Muslim Brotherhood rule — by sidelining those favouring more
wholesale reform among civilian protesters.”
“The surge of political, economic and strategic ties is
unprecedented,” says Zach Vertin, a research fellow at the Brookings
Institution in Doha. “This is about two regions fast becoming one.”
One of the starkest examples of the new relationship has been a dash
for maritime real estate. In 2014, Turkey’s Albayrak Group secured the
right to operate the main port in Mogadishu, the Somali capital. The
UAE’s DP World followed up by signing port deals in the
semi-autonomous Somali region of Puntland and the self-declared
independent state of Somaliland. Later Turkey, in 2017, and Qatar, in
2018, both agreed rights to develop ports in Sudan.
The Red Sea corridor that separates the African continent from the
Arabian Peninsula has long been contested. Britain established the
Protectorate of Somaliland in 1888 to help it control the shipping
routes from east Asia through the Red Sea to the Suez Canal.
Saad Ali Shire, Somaliland’s former foreign minister, says the new
investments from the Gulf are about projecting power and controlling
trade, just as they were in the 19th century. “The interest has always
been there but Turkey and the UAE are now wealthy states. They want to
show they are powers to be reckoned with in the region,” he says.
The UAE has been the most assertive actor with the clearest maritime
strategy. In addition to DP World’s agreements for ports in the Somali
towns of Berbera and Bosaso, the UAE has established a naval base at
Assab in Eritrea and controls, via its military intervention in Yemen,
at least six ports on the other side of the Red Sea.
The UAE last year pledged $3bn in financial aid and investment to
Addis Ababa, and the Gulf state and Saudi Arabia helped broker a peace
deal between Ethiopia and Eritrea, mediating talks to end the 20-year
conflict.
Mr Gargash says the expansion of economic links with the Horn is
consistent with the transformation of the UAE into the Middle East’s
main financial and trade hub. “Anything to do with airline rights,
free zones, storage, ports, for us is part of the narrative of why we
are successful,” he says. “So, clearly we have to find a way to reach
100m Ethiopians who need more than one port.”
The coming together of trade, security and geopolitical faultlines in
the Horn of Africa means the militarisation of the region is only
likely to continue, says Ahmed Soliman, a researcher at Chatham House.
It also means African powers risk getting sucked into regional
rivalries, he adds.

China [The BRI initiative], the Gulf Countries [who now appear to see
the Horn of Africa as their hinterland], Japan and India [to a lesser
degree] are all jostling for optimal ‘’geo-economic’’ positioning.

Mandy Chimuti looks at the menu board of the small cafe she manages in
northern Harare and takes out a black marker. One by one she crosses
items out. Coffee: no. Orange juice: no. Cheeseburger: no. Toasted
sandwich: no. In the end only salad and homemade lemonade remain.
“No power,” she explains. “Welcome to Zimbabwe. No power, no water, no cash.”
But last month inflation hit 98% and prices spiralled so much that a
basic margherita pizza in St Elmo’s cafe was priced at $180 on Friday,
while a bottle of cooking oil was on special offer at $26 in Spar.
“We used to have a political and economic crisis,” said Peter Mutasa,
president of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU).
“Now we have a humanitarian crisis. The system has created a whole sea
of people living in abject poverty. Workers are literally starving in
their houses.”
“I’m one hell of a satisfied customer,” he wrote. “This Super SUV is
unbelievable; that primordial roar is simply enthralling.”
When someone questioned how he got the $210,000 reported by ZimLive to
buy the supercar, he replied that it actually cost double that figure.
Her monthly salary is 600 RTGS (real-time gross settlement) — a
virtual currency, transferred by phone, an ingenious way for the
government to avoid printing money.
It was supposed to be worth 2½ to the dollar when introduced in
February. However by last week the rate had fallen to 14, equivalent
to £1 a day.

The Mind Game that ZANU-PF played on its citizens has evaporated in a
puff of smoke. President Mnangagwa was cavorting around the World with
his scarf

Dollar versus Rand 6 Month Chart INO 14.08 [Re Sell ZAR at 13.90]
http://quotes.ino.com/charting/index.html?s=FOREX_USDZAR&v=d6&t=c&a=50&w=1

Egypt Pound versus The Dollar 3 Month Chart INO  16.717
http://quotes.ino.com/charting/index.html?s=FOREX_USDEGP&v=d3&t=c&a=50&w=1

Egypt EGX30 Bloomberg +8.17% YTD
http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/CASE:IND

Nigeria All Share Bloomberg -4.66% YTD
http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/NGSEINDX:IND

Shares in Airtel Africa dropped sharply on Friday in a disappointing
debut for the SoftBank-backed company, which had priced its initial
offering at a valuation below that secured in two recent private
funding rounds.
The stock fell as much as 15 per cent to 68p after Africa’s
second-largest mobile operator listed on the London Stock Exchange,
knocking £500m off its opening valuation to give it a market
capitalisation of around £2.6bn.
Airtel Africa — which operates a telecoms and mobile money business
across 14 African countries — raised £595m through the offer, which
took place concurrently on the London and Nigerian exchanges and
represented 19 per cent of its total stock. The African subsidiary of
Indian telecoms giant Bharti Airtel had priced its shares at 80p, at
the bottom of its previously announced 80-100p price range. This
valued it at around £3.1bn, already significantly below the valuations
implied by earlier funding rounds. In October, it secured $1.25bn from
a consortium of investors including private equity house Warburg
Pincus, Singapore’s Temasek, SoftBank and Singapore Telecommunications
at a valuation of around $4.4bn. A $200m investment by the Qatar
Investment Authority earlier this year put its valuation closer to
$5bn.

Nairobi All Share Bloomberg +6.54% YTD
http://www.BLOOMBERG.COM/quote/NSEASI:IND

Nairobi ^NSE20 Bloomberg -7.08% YTD
http://j.mp/ajuMHJ

Every Listed Share can be interrogated here
http://www.rich.co.ke/rcdata/nsestocks.php