Zambia’s dollar debt plunged after official creditors co-led by China and France rejected a revised bondholder restructuring proposal, stalling the revamp of $3 billion of outstanding notes, Bloomberg News reported. The development, which calls into question a Group of 20 plan to help poor countries overhaul unsustainable loans, comes after Zambia last month reached a memorandum of understanding with official creditors to restructure $6.3 billion of debt. It needed to receive at least as favorable treatment from private creditors under the G20’s Common Framework guidelines.
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Africa
Resources Per Country
- Angola
- Benin
- Botswana
- Burkina Faso
- Cameroon
- Central African Republic
- Chad
- Congo
- Congo (Democratic Republic of the Congo)
- Cote d'Ivoire
- Djibouti
- Equatorial Guinea
- Eritrea
- Ethiopia
- Gabon
- Ghana
- Guinea
- Kenya
- Liberia
- Madagascar
- Mauritania
- Mauritius
- Mozambique
- Namibia
- Niger
- Nigeria
- Rwanda
- Senegal
- Seychelles
- Sierra Leone
- Somalia
- South Africa
- Sudan
- Tanzania
- Uganda
- Zambia
- Zimbabwe
Zambia's official creditors including China rejected a deal the country struck with its international bondholders because they believed its "base case" scenario did not deliver debt relief comparable to what they offered in a separate deal, two sources familiar with the talks said, Reuters reported. Official creditors said the agreement in principle, which the International Monetary Fund (IMF) also rejected, did not comply with "Comparability of Treatment", said the sources, who declined to be identified as the discussions are private.
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Nigerian President Bola Tinubu met top officials of the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) to negotiate a "multi-billion dollar infrastructure finance facility" to help build ports and power plants, his spokesperson said on Tuesday. Tinubu held talks with IsDB vice president Mansur Muhtar late on Monday in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, spokesperson Ajuri Ngelale said in a statement. He didn't provide further details of the finance package sought by the Nigerian government.
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Globally, there are currently more than 35,000 coworking spaces, and this figure is projected to increase to 41,000 by the close of 2024, reflecting a growth rate of approximately 21%. Notably, in South Africa, this growth rate has more than doubled, soaring to an impressive 44%, Biz Community reported. This demonstrates the robust demand for serviced and flexible workspaces that support evolving trends in hybrid and remote work, affirming their enduring presence in our daily lives.
U.S. businesses want certainty over the future of Washington's flagship trade program for Africa as they reduce their dependence on China and consider investing on the continent, a Biden administration official said on Saturday, Reuters reported. In the wake of the global pandemic and the supply chain headaches it provoked, companies across a range of industries are moving operations out of manufacturing powerhouse China in an effort to de-risk their businesses and foster resilience.
The South African Reserve Bank urged the government to address structural impediments such as record power cuts and poor infrastructure that are undermining its work by constraining supply, restraining economic growth and rapidly pushing up prices, Bloomberg News reported. The central bank is “meant to respond to short term cyclical issues — but if the structural issues don’t change, what happens in this economy is that it behaves all the time like it is over-heating,” Deputy Governor Fundi Tshazibana said in an interview on Saturday.
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Zimbabwe gave up its unenviable position of having the world’s highest interest rate to Argentina, after slashing borrowing costs to help boost economic growth, Bloomberg News reported. The monetary policy committee cut the benchmark interest rate to 130% from 150%, which lags Argentina’s 133%. The MPC acted because of “emerging global risks and the need to keep exchange rate and inflation expectations anchored to support economic growth,” Governor John Mangudya said in an emailed statement on Tuesday.
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A senior U.S. Treasury official on Monday said there were signs of "potential improvement" in sovereign debt restructuring cases and more vulnerable countries were expected to seek help, but further work was needed to accelerate the process, Reuters reported. Treasury Assistant Secretary for International Finance Brent Neiman noted advances in the cases of Zambia, Ghana and Sri Lanka over the past year, along with development of new technical approaches, adding his hope that Ghana would reach agreement on its external restructuring in the coming weeks.
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South Africa’s strained public finances are hindering economic growth and a return to lower inflation, the country’s central bank cautioned on Tuesday, Bloomberg News reported. “Reducing public debt to sustainable levels can deliver a triple dividend, namely lower cost of capital, reduced debt-service costs and lower inflation,” the South African Reserve Bank said in its six-monthly Monetary Policy Review. The comments come ahead of a Nov. 1 update on the nation’s budget outlook by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana.
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Kenya’s President William Ruto sought $1 billion more in loans from China Monday, despite rising public debt that has now reached $70 billion in the Eastern African country, according to National Treasury figures for 2022/2023, the Associated Press reported. President Ruto was was one of a number of global leaders in Beijing to attend the tenth anniversary meeting of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, the ambitious plan that aims to connect Africa, Asia and Europe through massive infrastructure and energy projects.
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