South Africa’s biggest lenders raised $322-million in new loss-absorbing debt to comply with a central bank framework designed to ensure failing financial institutions can be recapitalised without taxpayer bailouts, Bloomberg News reported. Absa Group Ltd. raised R3.2-billion through the new instruments that are known as funding for loss-absorbing capacity, or FLAC, notes, the lender said in a statement Friday. They’re linked to Zaronia, the reference rate for short-term financial contracts that the central bank is introducing to replace the Johannesburg interbank average rate by year-end.

Tongaat Hulett, a 134-year-old South African sugar maker, is on the brink of collapse again as its administrators prepare to place the firm into provisional liquidation, MoneyWab.co.za reported. The joint practitioners for business rescue have applied to the High Court to discontinue their proceedings and place Tongaat into provisional liquidation after exhausting all reasonable options, the company said in a statement on Thursday. The move follows the collapse of the approved rescue plan after the sale agreements with its strategic partner Vision Group lapsed, it said.

Wananchi Group, the operator of Zuku internet and pay-television services, is facing a statutory insolvency demand of KSh.46.9 million from CP Cables, drawing attention to the financial pressures behind the fibre broadband market, KenyanWallStreet.com reported. The amount involved is modest by telecommunications standards, but the legal mechanism carries weight. Non-compliance with a statutory demand is treated as evidence that a company is unable to meet its obligations as they fall due, shifting what might otherwise be a commercial dispute into the insolvency arena.

Zimbabwe has agreed a staff-monitored programme with the International Monetary Fund, a senior official said on Friday, a tentative first step on the way to a closer engagement with the Fund and an eventual loan programme, Reuters reported. A staff-monitored programme is an informal agreement between a country and the IMF that can open the door to financial support from the Fund, help restart one that has gone off track, or enable repeat access to emergency assistance.

KOKO Networks, one of Kenya’s most visible clean-cooking startups, has shut down its operations and laid off its entire workforce following a dispute with the Kenyan government over carbon credit approvals, bringing a sudden halt to a business model that had become central to the country’s clean energy transition for low-income households, AfricaSustainabilityMatters.com reported.

Nigeria is set to pass a law that would place it among the first African countries to regulate artificial intelligence, tightening oversight of one of the continent’s fastest-growing digital markets after years of largely unchecked expansion by global technology firms, Bloomberg News reported. The National Digital Economy and E-Governance Bill would give regulators new powers over data, algorithms and digital platforms, filling a vacuum that has existed since Nigeria published its draft AI strategy in 2024.

Gabon's President Brice Oligui Nguema has replaced his finance minister, Henri-Claude Oyima, according to a decree, as the oil-producing Central African country grapples with a liquidity squeeze and rising arrears, Reuters reported. Gabon has become increasingly reliant on regional capital markets to meet its financing needs, though appetite for its debt "has weakened substantially", ratings agency Fitch said last month, when it downgraded the country's long-term foreign-currency issuer default rating.

The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) will take losses on a $750 million loan to Ghana following the resolution of a dispute over the facility, Bloomberg News reported. On Thursday, Afreximbank announced that it had resolved the dispute with Ghana over the loan, but did not disclose whether it would formally absorb the losses on the debt. The Cairo-based lender said issues surrounding the 2022 facility had been settled “to the satisfaction of both parties,” without providing details of the agreement.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has revoked the operating licences of Aso Savings and Loans Plc and Union Homes Savings and Loans Plc, citing persistent regulatory infractions and deepening financial distress, Guardian.ng reported. The revocation, which took effect on December 15, 2025, was carried out under Section 12 of the Banks and Other Financial Institutions Act (BOFIA) 2020 and Section 7.3 of the Revised Guidelines for Mortgage Banks in Nigeria, the CBN stated in a press release yesterday.