35
Zimbabwe is to sell shares in 35 state-owned firms, including telecoms and mining entities in the latest step to revive the economy under new political leadership, Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa said on Friday. Targeted firms include mobile carriers NetOne and Telecel, fixed line operator TelOne and savings bank POSB, all owned by the state. Shares in 17 government-run mines would also be sold. Like most parastatals, the mines, which mainly produce gold, have struggled over the years due to lack of capital and mismanagement, forcing some to close.
40
National Microfinance Bank (NMB), Tanzania’s biggest bank by market capitalisation, is ready to participate in a needed consolidation of Tanzania’s fragmented banking sector, its chief executive said. Tanzania’s banking sector, hit by bad loans and low lending, would be healthier if smaller banks were taken over by larger ones, Ineke Bussemaker told Reuters. The East African nation has about 40 licensed banks, but the sector is dominated by a handful of big lenders. Netherlands-based Rabobank Group is NMB’s biggest shareholder with a 34.9 percent stake, while the Tanzanian government owns 31.9 percent.
$3.5bn
Kenya’s second-biggest infrastructure project since independence five decades ago, a $3.5 billion inter-city expressway, will be delayed amid concerns by lawmakers that East Africa’s largest economy is taking on too much debt, the company building it said. The nation’s debt could rise to 58 percent of gross domestic product by the end of June, from 40.6 percent in the 2011-12 fiscal year, according to World Bank estimates.
$100m
Russian IT services company IBS has postponed its planned initial public offering due to the Moscow market volatility caused by imposition of fresh US sanctions against the country. IBS said last week it would launch a flotation on the Moscow exchange and was said to be raising $100m by selling 30-35 per cent of its enlarged capital. Two days after that announcement, Washington said it was placing sanctions on seven Russian oligarchs, 12 of their companies and 17 Russia officials, leading to a run on the rouble and the largest daily fall in the Moscow stock market since 2014.
$71.50
With oil at above $71 a barrel, OPEC is beginning to reformulate its target in terms of upstream investment rather than oil inventories, according to an analysis of recent statements made by ministers from member countries. “There is no such thing as a target price by Saudi Arabia,” the kingdom’s energy minister, Khalid al-Falih, told reporters on Wednesday (“Saudi Arabia happy with oil market, won’t let another glut form”, Reuters
