The rand and South African bonds extended declines as foreign investors dumped the country’s notes in the wake of government forecasts for higher public debt and wider budget deficits in the next three years, Bloomberg News reported. Stocks rose to a record as gains for rand hedges offset drops for banks and retailers. The nation’s currency extended its longest losing streak in a month, while the yield on benchmark 10-year notes rose to the highest in 16 months.

Nigeria’s Senate voted in favour on Tuesday of launching an investigation into the default on a $1.2 billion loan earlier this year by Etisalat Nigeria and into how the funds were used. Etisalat Nigeria, now called 9mobile, took out a syndicated loan from 13 Nigerian banks but failed to make repayments earlier this year, Reuters reported. “The Senate is aware of allegations that the loans had been diverted to other uses not related to the business, as there was no evidence of what the company did with the loans,” the upper house said in an order paper published on Twitter.

Nigerian lenders have picked Barclays to try to find new investors for debt-laden 9mobile, two banking sources said on Thursday. Barclays has started work on the mandate and is in the process of setting up a database for prospective investors to conduct due diligence, they said. Banking sources had previously said Citigroup and Standard Bank were in the running for the role, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. But the lenders decided against them due to their previous links with 9mobile, the sources said on Thursday.

Britain’s Serious Fraud Office will charge two former executives of collapsed oil company Afren on Wednesday with alleged fraud over payments they received via secret companies relating to business deals in Nigeria, Reuters reported. The SFO said in a statement former Afren Chief Executive Osman Shahenshah and former Chief Operating Officer Shahid Ullah would appear at Westminster Magistrates Court charged with two counts of fraud and two counts of money laundering.

A Bloomberg News report that South Africa’s National Treasury is seeking as much as 100 billion rand ($7.5 billion) from the government workers’ pension fund to finance struggling state companies is untrue, Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba said. The Public Investment Corp., which manages the fund and has about 1.86 trillion rand in assets, has been asked by the Treasury to buy its entire 12 billion-rand stake in Telkom SA SOC Ltd. to pay for a bailout of South African Airways, two people with direct knowledge of the situation told Bloomberg News last week.

Debt and corruption scandals at Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. make the utility the biggest risk to South Africa’s economy and the government needs to replace its management, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said. Eskom plans to raise almost 340 billion rand ($26 billion) in the next five years, while meeting 413 billion rand of interest and debt repayments, which amount to 8 percent of South Africa’s gross domestic product, Bloomberg News reported.

The boards of West Africa-focused Avocet Mining and its Societe des Mines de Belahouro (SMB) subsidiary will resume talks on Friday aimed at saving the struggling gold operation from insolvency, Reuters reported. SMB, which operates the Inata gold mine in Burkina Faso, is is struggling to keep the mine operating after former workers seized a shipment of gold last year and faces possible insolvency after the expiry of a freeze on loan repayments. The boards of SMB and Avocet, which owns 90 percent of the Inata mine, were to meet on Sept. 8 to consider “all available options”, Avocet had said.

Gold miner Avocet Mining Plc said on Monday it will consider filing for insolvency of its subsidiary Societe des Mines de Belahouro (SMB), which operates the Inata gold mine in Burkina Faso, after the unit’s standstill agreement with its creditors expired, Reuters reported. The boards of SMB and Avocet will meet on Sept. 8 to consider “all available options, including the potential filing of an insolvency petition by SMB”, Avocet said in a statement. SMB’s financial and trade creditors could not agree among themselves on an extension of the agreement, the company said.

Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. is prepared to inject as much as 5 billion rand ($386 million) to pay off bank debt owed by AfriSam Group Pty Ltd. and help South Africa’s second-biggest cement producer clinch a tie-up with larger rival PPC Ltd., according to two people familiar with the matter. The money from the African unit of the Canadian insurer will be used to repay bank loans and allow AfriSam to push through a new offer to PPC, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the details are private, Bloomberg News reported.

Nigeria’s Access Bank said on Wednesday it had booked a 4 billion naira ($13 million) impairment on its loan to troubled telecoms firm 9mobile, formerly known as Etisalat Nigeria. Access Chief Executive Herbert Wigwe said the bank had a direct exposure of 11 billion naira to 9mobile, as well as an exposure of 35-39 billion naira to the telecoms firm’s suppliers, Reuters reported. Wigwe told an analysts’ call that Access hoped to recover the debt once 9mobile was sold to new investors.