Story of the Day
Losing your job suddenly whether you’ve been laid off or resigned because you felt you had no choice can be incredibly disheartening. One tends to get into a state of confusion with mixed reactions and decision making sometimes can be impaired. It’s not unusual for someone to feel like a failure; asking yourself what you could have done different to avoid this fall out. However, after all the emotions, we need to move on look forward to the next chapters in your life. Having experienced this myself, I learnt a few things that have helped me to deal with the situation and thought I can share with the person reading. Read more
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Over 600 job opportunities will be created at the Nickel mine to be developed in Kalumbila in the Northwestern province. Traditional leaders and stakeholders in the Province say the opening of Enterprise, a Nickel Mine at Trident Limited is an economic game changer for the region. Meanwhile North Western Province Minister Robert Lihefu says President Hichilema is Tuesday expected to grace the ground breaking ceremony of Enterprise Mine. Read more: ZNBC
The Zambia Consumer Association – ZACA has expressed concern over the continued delay and soft stance by state ICT regulator ZICTA to give Zambian consumers a 4th mobile phone operator which has now by passed the expected timelines. The Zambia Information and Communication Technology Authority – ZICTA – had in 2021 indicated that it had granted a local firm Beeline Telecom Limited a license to commence mobile phone operations in the country within the period of 6 months. This timeline was extended and a new deadline was given to Beeline to commence operations by 30th June 2022, and this has also not materialized. Read more: Zambian Business Times
President Hakainde Hichilema has challenged Zesco and Sino-Hydro to explore more investment opportunities in power generation on the Itezhi Itezhi and Kafue Gorge power generation stations to boost the country’s power output from the current 1,800 megawatts (MW) to 2,000MW. However, the head of State wants cost-effective implementation of the energy projects. “What we are saying is that this river (Kafue River), before it gets into the Zambezi River where we begin to share it with others, we can gen-erate more power than the 1,800 megawatts. “I’m asking the partners to generate 2,000 megawatts or gigawatts to add to the solar energy. We can do a bit more,” he said. Read more: Zambia Daily Mail
Stanbic Bank has pledged its continued support towards growing the agribusiness in the country as a measure to upscale the agriculture sector. Stanbic Bank Head of Agribusiness Edith Chuma says the private sector, which includes financial institutions, has a role to play in the agriculture value chain process, leading to economic development. Read more: Lusaka Times
International Business and Finance
Zimbabwe’s central bank has launched gold coins in an effort to help curb soaring inflation amid a slump in the country’s currency. The central bank’s main interest rate was more than doubled this month to 200% after the annual rate of inflation rose above 190%. Each coin will be priced at the international market rate for an ounce of gold plus 5% for production costs. As of Friday, an ounce was worth about $1,724. Read more: ZNBC
Pan-African bank Ecobank Transnational Incorporated (ETI) has released its condensed unaudited consolidated financial report the half-year period ended June 30, 2022. A copy of the report, which Business Insider Africa obtained from the Nigerian Exchange, showed some very positive financial indicators. For one, ETI’s gross earnings jumped to $1.2 billion, marking a 12% compared to $1.090 billion in H1 2021. Similarly, total revenue rose by 10% to $909.8 million against $824.5 million in half-year 2021. Read more: Business Insider
U.S. stock futures fell on Tuesday morning after Walmart cut its profit forecast, sending retail stocks tumbling after hours. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures fell by 120 points, or 0.38%. S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures declined 0.3% and 0.39%, respectively. Read more: CNBC
US business activity contracted in July for the first time in more than two years as manufacturers and service providers signaled sluggish demand that only adds to heightened recession anxieties. The S&P Global flash composite purchasing managers output index slid 4.8 points to 47.5, the weakest reading since May 2020, the group reported Friday. Outside of the early months of the pandemic, the July figure is the weakest in data back to 2009. Read more: Al Jazeera
Capital Markets Report
In 21 trades recorded yesterday, 24,166 shares were transacted resulting in a turnover of K37,702. A share price gain was recorded in CEC Africa on the quoted tier of K0.12. A share price loss of K0.01 was recorded in Zanaco. Trading activity was also recorded in Copperbelt Energy Corporation, Chilanga Cement, Madison Financial Services, Standard Chartered Zambia and Zambia Breweries. The LuSE All Share Index (LASI) closed at 6,884.94 points, 0.05% down from its previous close of 6,888.26 points. The market closed on a capitalization of K70,900,615,953 including Shoprite Holdings and K36,117,930,513 excluding Shoprite Holdings.