Story of the Day:
Extant financial services company, Madison Financial Services has reported a financial performance at half-year that shows “brand is everything” in financial services. Read more
Local Business and Finance Sponsored By Liquid Telecom
Minister of Mines and Minerals Development Mr Richard Musukwa has expressed happiness with the progress made at Kasenseli Gold Mine project in Mwinilunga District. The project being developed by Zambia Gold Company Ltd (ZGC) owned by ZCCM-IH (51%) and Ministry of Finance (49%) has so far produced 50 kilograms of gold worth USD $3 million. Read more: Zambia Reports
Zambia’s private sector activity marginally rose to 46.6 for September compared to 43.4 levels in the previous months weighed by rising input inflation and delays in supply delivery as out travel restrictions continue to weigh. This is the eighteenth time in a row that the copper producer is headlining PMI in contraction with the last time Zambia recording positive being February 2019. Read more: The Business Telegraph
Economic diversification should not prevent Zambia from exploiting its mineral wealth, says Stanbic Bank Zambia. The country’s largest bank has warned that while pushing for economic diversification is important, there is need to ensure the country’s mineral wealth and the mining sector were not neglected. Read more: Mining Weekly
MTN Zambia has partnered with ZTE to construct a cross-border optical transmission network backbone in Zambia. The network will provide connections between Zambia’s borders and its capital Lusaka, the backbone network will effectively reduce the cost per Megabyte (MB) of accessing internet data, thereby greatly improving user experience and delivering economic benefits. Read more: Capacity Media
ZRA Commissioner Customs, Sydney Chibbabbuka, says the authority remains committed to promoting fair competition in the country. Mr. Chibbabbuka says besides just collecting taxes, the authority has a responsibility to protect industry from unfair competition because of smuggling. Read more: ZNBC
Zesco said on Monday that it intends to save about 12 megawatts of electricity through the installation of energy-saving bulbs. Read more: Xinhua
International Business and Finance
The IMF predicted in June a contraction of 4.9% in global GDP for 2020 — but the fall could be even higher as many governments are now dealing with a second wave of infections. Now, the IMF is calling on governments to increase public investment to aid an economic recovery and create jobs. “For advanced and emerging market economies … Increasing public investment by 1% of GDP in these economies would create 7 million jobs directly, and between 20 million and 33 million jobs overall when considering the indirect macroeconomic effects.” Read more: CNBC
Stocks in Asia-Pacific were higher in Tuesday trade as the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) kept its current policy settings on hold. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index advanced 0.75% by the afternoon. Read more: CNBC
The European Central Bank should prepare to issue a digital euro to complement banknotes “if and when” it becomes necessary, ECB board member Fabio Panetta said. Major central banks around the world are studying digital versions of their currencies to address demand for electronic means of payment and fend off competition from private tokens such as Bitcoin and Facebook’s proposed Libra. Read more: Reuters
Washington is taking aim at another Chinese company. SMIC, China’s biggest chipmaker, has warned investors that new US restrictions could cut it off from key technology and have “material adverse effects” on its business. Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation said in a filing to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange that its American suppliers have been issued letters from the US Commerce Department about rules for working with the chipmaker. Read more: CNN
Capital Markets Report Sponsored By ZCCM-IH
In 16 trades recorded yesterday, 6,076 shares were transacted yielding a market turnover of K64,858. Trading activity was recorded in AEL Zambia and Lafarge. The LuSE All Share Index (LASI) maintained its close at 3,811.81 points, as there were no share price movements. The market closed on a capitalization of K55,412,419,062 including Shoprite Holdings and K21,173,213,082 excluding Shoprite Holdings.
Chart of the Day: