Ethiopia needs about $3.5 billion in relief from debt restructuring through 2027-28, according to the International Monetary Fund, setting the key parameters for creditors to negotiate deals with the government, Bloomberg News reported. Overall, Africa’s second-most populous nation faces a financing gap of more than $20 billion over the period, the Washington-based lender said this week in a report outlining its $3.4 billion economic program. That reduces to $10.7 billion after actions including proceeds from privatization processes and an existing debt suspension with creditors, it said.

Ethiopia’s defaulted international bond jumped after the International Monetary Fund agreed to lend the country $3.4 billion over four years as part of an economic reform program, a key step that’s also expected to ease negotiations with creditors on restructuring its debt, Bloomberg News reported. The decision will allow the immediate disbursement of about $1 billion, the fund said in a statement on Monday announcing the loan. The IMF funds are part of about $10.7 billion that eastern Africa’s biggest economy expects from creditors through loans, grants and debt re-profiling.

South Africa is getting closer to publishing long-awaited changes to its financial rules and has earmarked over-the-counter derivatives for greater scrutiny, alongside unlisted financial market activity, Bloomberg News reported. Regulators have been undertaking a financial market review for several years and “are at the point where we are able to put through some of those recommendations,” said Financial Sector Conduct Authority Executive Director Olano Makhubela.

Mozambique won a fraud case over a $2 billion bond scandal that embroiled Credit Suisse and created a financial crisis for the southern African nation, Bloomberg News reported. After a three month trial, a London judge ruled that Mozambique was defrauded in a controversial maritime project meant to finance the construction of a new coastal patrol and a tuna fishing fleet. The government-backed fundraising was plagued by corrupt deals, with hundreds of millions of dollars looted, while much of the debt was kept hidden from bondholders and other lenders.

Ethiopia’s central bank allowed the nation’s currency to trade freely, a key reform needed to secure more than $10 billion of funding and debt relief it’s been negotiating with the International Monetary Fund. The birr plunged. The National Bank of Ethiopia permitted banks to buy and sell foreign currency at freely negotiated rates, according to a directive on its website, Bloomberg News reported.

Ethiopia’s official creditors have granted financing assurances to the country to help fast-track approval of a new loan by the International Monetary Fund’s executive board, Bloomberg News reported. Members of an official creditor committee held a meeting last week to approve the financing assurances, according to two of the people, who asked not to be named because the talks are private. Financing assurances mean that bilateral creditors such as the Paris Club and China provided certainty that they will restructure their loans to Ethiopia in a way that’s consistent with the fund’s program.

Zambia’s proposed ban on charging foreign currency in local transactions — punishable with 10-year jail terms — might defeat its own purpose, according to the International Monetary Fund, Bloomberg News reported. The central bank of Africa’s second-biggest copper producer in June unveiled the plans to curb increasing dollarization in the economy that it said blunts its tools to fight inflation. Businesses have already pushed-back on proposed regulations calling them “punitive” and warning that they may actually fuel price growth.

South Africa’s central bank kept interest rates on hold in a split decision, with two of the six policymakers favoring a cut which could signal a shift toward easing as soon as September, Bloomberg News reported. The monetary policy committee left its benchmark interest rate unchanged at a 15-year high of 8.25% for a seventh consecutive meeting, Governor Lesetja Kganyago said in a virtual press conference Thursday. He said the two MPC officials who favored a cut wanted to lower rates by 25 basis points while the other four wanted to keep rates on hold.

The African Development Bank said Thursday it had approved a $1 billion loan to South Africa's state-owned rail and ports company, Transnet, the Associated Press reported. The 25-year loan was wholly guaranteed by the South African government and will help finance the first phase of a $8.1 billion investment plan for Transnet to improve the country's ailing rail and port infrastructure, the bank said.

Nigeria’s annual inflation quickened for an 18th straight month, raising the prospect of another interest-rate increase when the central bank meets next week, Bloomberg News reported. Consumer prices rose 34.2% in June from 34% a month earlier, according to data published on the website of the National Bureau of Statistics on Monday. The median estimate of eight economists in a Bloomberg survey was 34%. The main drivers of the acceleration were higher rental, transport and grain costs.