Economy

CAIRO (Capital Markets in Africa) – Egyptian inflation eased unexpectedly to its lowest rate in more than three years, with some analysts predicting a greater chance of the central bank cutting interest rates in the coming months. Consumer prices in urban parts of Egypt rose by an annual 9.4% in June, compared with 14.1% in May, the state-run statistics agency, CAPMAS, said Wednesday. On a monthly basis, food prices declined 2.2%. Although the extent of the deceleration was…

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – The risk of South Africa’s struggling state power utility going bust doesn’t appear to faze one of its biggest creditors: the World Bank. The Washington-based lender agreed to lend Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. $4 billion almost a decade ago to boost its generation capacity and avoid a repetition of rolling blackouts. Mismanagement and construction cost overruns have seen the state of the utility’s finances going from bad to worse since then,…

TUNIS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Fitch Ratings affirmed at ‘B+’ Tunisia’s long-term foreign and local currency Issuer Default Ratings, with a ‘negative’ outlook. It indicated that the ratings are constrained by fiscal and current account deficits, elevated public and external debt levels, a challenging political environment and subdued economic growth. The agency expected economic activity in the 2019-21 period to be supported by higher investments and exports, strong tourism activity, as well as robust…

RABAT (Capital Markets in Africa) – The Institute of International Finance projected Morocco’s real GDP growth rate to decelerate from 3% in 2018 to 2.3% in 2019, mainly due to a 2% contraction in the agricultural sector’s activity. In parallel, it forecast non-agricultural growth to accelerate from 2.9% in 2018 to 3.1% in 2019. It considered that downside risks to the growth outlook include volatile weather conditions, as well as lower economic growth in Europe,…

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – Fitch Ratings indicated that the public debt level in Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries has significantly increased, as the median debt level of the 19 Fitch-rated SSA sovereigns doubled from 27% of GDP at the end of 2012 to an estimated 56% of GDP at end-2018. It noted that SSA sovereigns have used some of the fiscal space that was afforded by the Highly Indebted Poor Countries initiative to boost…

CAIRO (Capital Markets in Africa) – Deutsche Bank considered that Egypt’s reform program with the International Monetary Fund has been successful in reducing macroeconomic imbalances and improving the country’s growth prospects. It projected real GDP growth to accelerate from 5.5% in the fiscal year that ends in June 2019 to 5.9% in FY2019/20, supported by higher oil, gas and renewable energy production, sustained spending on state-sponsored mega-projects, as well as by a recovery in private…

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – Moody’s Investors Service said South Africa’s credit-rating outlook is stable, giving the country’s new government more time to tackle key challenges such as low economic growth and embattled state-owned companies to ward off junk status. With May’s national elections over, the new government “will put forward policies to continue tackling the main credit challenges, including a low growth, steadily rising debt, leveraged state-owned enterprises and weakened institutions,” Moody’s said….