5 important things happening in South Africa today
·8 Apr 2019
Here’s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:
- While Eskom is promising to keep the lights on this winter and over the short term, South Africa’s energy crisis may hit new levels of bad over the next 5 years, as a quarter of Eskom’s stations are scheduled to reach their end of life and be decommissioned. [Bloomberg]
- Energy regulator Nersa has wiped out the government bailout of R69 billion for Eskom. Its calculation method in granting the power utility price hikes involved calculating Eskom’s ROI for each of the three coming years, then deducted the government bailout, effectively negating it. [Business Day]
- A new forensic report has again fingered former Transnet and Eskom execs Brain Molefe and Anoj Singh as leading the SOEs straight into the hands of Gupta-controlled companies which scored millions through irregular contracts. The report recommends legal action against them. [TimesLive]
- The ANC is hopeful that the UK will be able to make a deal by Friday around leaving the EU, but as it stands it is prepared for a no-deal Brexit. With the EU making up over three quarters of FDI in South Africa, a no-deal would impact some trade agreements. [BusinessLive]
- South Africa’s rand firmed on Friday, ending the first week of the new quarter more than 2% firmer as slow wage growth in the US helped maintain demand for emerging currencies. On Monday the rand was at R14.14 to the dollar, R18.48 to the pound and R15.88 to the euro.
Loading ...