Story of the Day
Zambia Sugar’s revenue for the year ended 31 August 2022 was K5.111 billion, 2.4% above the prior year comparative, bolstered largely by a 5% growth in domestic sales volume. Export sales were down compared to previous year as priority was given to satisfying the domestic market in view of limited stocks and the Kwacha appreciation against the US dollar over the year resulting in lower realisations. Operating profit for the year was K1.243 billion underpinned by the continued strong growth in domestic sales which is the primary market for the business. This was a strong financial performance which is similar to the previous year considering an 8% decrease in sales due to lower production, cost increases and supply chain disruptions triggered by global events and stripping out the effects of the weak Kwacha in 2021. After tax profit reduced marginally from K1.087 billion to K1.005 billion. Read more
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The Export-Import Bank of China (EximBank) will lead Beijing’s team to renegotiate nearly $6 billion of loans that Zambia owes to Chinese state-owned creditors, the country’s finance ministry told Reuters on Thursday. EximBank, one of Beijing’s three policy banks and Zambia’s single largest Chinese creditor, is the linchpin in China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) that oversees infrastructure lending. Read more: Reuters
Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei on Thursday launched an information communication technology (ICT) fund to develop innovation leaders to accelerate Zambia’s digital transformation agenda. Dubbed the Hakainde Hichilema Innovation Fund, the fund is part of the four-year partnership and initiative by Huawei that will see the training on ICT of 5,000 young people by the year 2025. Read more: Xinhua
Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA) Commissioner General Dingani Banda has said the digital age has significantly transformed the way revenue authorities operates, resulting reskilling of employees in order to meet the rising demand for better services from taxpayers and other stakeholders. Speaking at the 7th General Assembly of the African Tax Administration Forum (ATAF) yesterday in Lagos, Nigeria, Mr. Banda said new technological advancements in areas such as Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning will potentially have a more significant overall impact and alter tax administration. He said as a result, tax Administrations are now formulating strategies and aligning them to the transforming technological environment in which taxpayers operate, in most cases driven by other players in the ecosystem. Read more: Lusaka Times
Senior officials from Zimbabwe and Zambia have met to review progress on the implementation of the agreed areas of cooperation in the tourism sector. The second meeting, held under the auspices of the Zimbabwe-Zambia Joint Tourism Technical Committee (JTTC), took place from October 31 to November 2, in Livingstone, Zambia. Permanent Secretary for Environment, Climate, Tourism and Hospitality Industry, Ambassador Raphael Faranisi, co-chaired the crucial meeting, with Zambia’s permanent secretary in the Ministry of Tourism, Mr Evans Muhanga. The key objective of the meeting was to review progress on the implementation of the agreed areas of cooperation from the first JTTC meeting of 2018 and the special JTTC indaba held in 2019. Read more: The Herald
Updates From The Africa Fintech Summit In Cape Town
With global capital becoming nervous, Africa is proving to be an interesting exception when it comes to venture capital appetite for investment. Overall there has been a global decline in VC investment in Fintech. Africa however has not suffered as much as would have been anticipated. This is largely because there has been a lot of optimism of the young population that has fast become tech savvy and is the future of the region. VC involvement in Africa has been evolving. Many VCs now understand the importance of not only investing in founders but holding their hands through the various stages of the process of fund raising. Here are some highlights of the VC’s panel discussion at the Africa Fintech Summit 2022. Read more
The Africa Fintech Summit is underway in Cape Town at the International Convention Center. We had an opportunity to have a conversation with one of Africa’s leading fintech whose representative at the event coincidently owes a large part of his career growth to their Zambian outfit. Meet David Waithaka, Cellulant Chief Commercial Officer. Read more
We had the opportunity to sit down with Flutterwave, a Nigerian fintech company that provides a payment infrastructure for global merchants and payment service providers across the continent, to get their insights into the importance of this years African Fintech Summit. Meet Munya Chiura, Head of Growth, Rest of Africa at Flutterwave. Read more
International Business and Finance
The Bank of England has warned the UK is facing its longest recession since records began, as it raised interest rates by the most in 33 years. It warned the UK would face a “very challenging” two-year slump with unemployment nearly doubling by 2025. Bank boss Andrew Bailey warned of a “tough road ahead” for UK households, but said it had to act forcefully now or things “will be worse later on”. It lifted interest rates to 3% from 2.25%, the biggest jump since 1989. Read more: BBC News
Apple is now worth more than fellow tech giants Alphabet, Amazon and Meta combined, after it ended trading Wednesday with a market value of $2.307 trillion. At the same time, the market caps of its three tech giant peers added up to $2.306 trillion at the close of trading Wednesday. Google parent Alphabet’s market cap stood at $1.126 trillion, Amazon’s at $939.78 billion and Facebook parent Meta’s at $240.07 billion, Yahoo Finance data showed. Overall, Big Tech stocks suffered a brutal selloff last week on the back of disappointing quarterly earnings. But Apple’s stock has outperformed its peers after it beat Wall Street’s revenue and profit forecasts for its fourth quarter. Read more: Business Insider
Barclays cut its forecast for China’s economic growth next year to 3.8%, based partly on expectations of a drop in global demand for Chinese goods. The firm’s U.S. and European economics teams forecast recessions next year, Barclays’ Hong Kong-based Jian Chang and Yingke Zhou said in a report Wednesday. As a result, they now expect China’s exports to drop by 2% to 5% in 2023, versus previous expectations for 1% growth, the report said. Read more: CNBC
PayPal shares fell more than 5% in after-hours trading, despite beating earnings and revenue expectations for the third quarter, as the company’s Q4 revenue estimate came in behind analysts’ expectations. The company estimated Q4 revenues to come in at $7.38 billion, which is less than the $7.74 billion consensus expectations, according to analysts surveyed by Refinitiv. Read more: CNBC
Capital Markets Report
In 61 trades recorded yesterday, 45,218 shares were transacted resulting in a turnover of K219,658.04.Trading activity was also recorded in AECI, Bata, Copperbelt Energy Corporation Zambia, Chilanga Cement, PUMA, Standard Chartered Bank Limited, Zambia Breweries and Zambia Sugar. The LuSE All Share Index (LASI) maintained its close at 7,233.54 points as there was no share price movement. The market closed on a capitalization of K72,417,985,445.77 including Shoprite Holdings and K37,635,300,005.77 excluding Shoprite Holdings.
