Finance

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) The rand has become the whipping boy for investors concerned about South Africa’s struggling electricity utility and its impact on the country’s economy. After posting the best start to a year on record on January, the currency is heading for its biggest February loss since Bloomberg started compiling the data in 1989. Eskom’s bonds, meanwhile, are behaving as if there’s no problem, even as traders fret about the government’s ability to rescue the state-owned company…

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – EOH Holdings Ltd., the South African IT company reeling after an anonymous complaint prompted Microsoft Corp. to abruptly cancel a contract, has created an app that will make that process easier for future whistleblowers. Expose-It, which was made available for download on Monday, enables those with sensitive information about their company or organization to pass it on to relevant authorities without fear of being identified. The app is designed to…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – Rules put in place to save U.K. taxpayers from bailing out major lenders again are having an unintended side effect. They’re encouraging HSBC Holdings Plc to wade into a market it long neglected: British mortgages. Trading updates in recent weeks from Nationwide Building Society, Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc and Metro Bank Plc said competition to lend to British home buyers was intensifying, even with Brexit looming. HSBC has been wooing first-time home buyers in…

LONDON (Capital Markets in Africa) – Honda Motor Co. is planning to close its factory in the U.K., dealing a new blow to a British auto industry already struggling with a Brexit-related slowdown and potential tariffs, Sky News reported, citing an unnamed source close to the company. The Japanese manufacturer could announce the decision to close the plant in Swindon by 2022 as early as Tuesday. The factory, Honda’s only one in the EU, employs around…

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – A South African company embroiled in allegations that it paid millions of rand a month in bribes to secure government contracts is facing collapse, becoming the biggest casualty since President Cyril Ramaphosa started a probe into state corruption. African Global Operations, the services company formerly known as Bosasa, will apply for either a voluntary liquidation or business rescue after a local bank informed the firm it will close its accounts by the…

NAIROBI (Capital Markets in Africa) – Kenya said it’s almost reached an agreement with the International Monetary Fund on a new standby loan facility after a meeting this week in the East Africa nation’s capital, Nairobi. A similar facility, where the IMF availed $1.5 billion for Kenya to draw from in the event of balance of payment shocks, but didn’t, lapsed in September. The insurance-type facility will serve to reassure buyers of Kenyan debt such as…

LAGOS (Capital Markets in Africa) – President Donald Trump said he’s open to extending a March 1 deadline to raise tariffs on Chinese products if the two sides are near an agreement, sending a conciliatory signal amid talks to resolve the trade war between the world’s two biggest economies. “If we’re close to a deal where we think we can make a real deal and it’s going to get done, I could see myself letting that slide…