News in South Africa 19th September: 1. Load shedding suspended: Eskom will suspend load-shedding for an additional seven hours on Tuesday, 19 September 2023, due to improved generation capacity and reduced breakdowns. In a statement on Tuesday morning, the utility said that 13,577MW of generation capacity was unavailable due to breakdowns. Therefore, it would suspend load-shedding […]
News in South Africa 4th September: 1. Social unrest warning: South Africa is at high risk of social unrest due to its high unemployment, rising inequality, and increased lawlessness. PwC senior economist Xhanti Payi told 702 that South African companies will face increased uncertainty and volatility until the country addresses its major social problems. “This is something […]
News in South Africa 20th July: 1. Division over interest rate hikes: Economists are divided over whether South Africa’s central bank will pause interest-rate increases on Thursday, or extend its longest phase of monetary tightening since 2006. Deteriorating inflation expectations, currency risks and enhancements to the South African Reserve Bank’s quarterly projection model, used to […]
News in South Africa 31st May: 1. Reserve Bank preps for grid collapse: South Africa’s central bank is working on a contingency plan to ensure the country’s payments system remains in operation in the event the nation’s electricity grid collapses. The South African Reserve Bank and other financial markets regulators including the operator of the […]
News in South Africa 19th January: 1. Eskom diesel nightmare: Eskom is living hand-to-mouth in its efforts to obtain the diesel needed to continue running its open-cycle gas turbines (OCGTs), which, in the face of prolonged power generation outages, is the only way the utility can stave off severe and ongoing curtailment of South Africa’s […]
News in South Africa 17th January: 1. Hardships pile up for consumers: Economists are raising red flags over higher inflation rates, which will invariably lead to more interest rate hikes from the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) as South Africans continue to sit under the pressure of high levels of load shedding and a massive […]
News in South Africa 9th December: 1. SA – US trade issues: South Africa could lose part of its preferential access to the US if its trade policies disadvantage American exporters relative to their developed-nation counterparts, according to people familiar with the matter. Thousands of South African products enter the world’s biggest market duty-free under […]
News in South Africa 30th November: 1. Eskom’s power station shut down plan: Eskom plans to decommission and repurpose coal-fired power plants at Camden, Hendrina, and Grootvlei at an estimated $2.6 billion (R44 billion) for the three. This follows the government decommissioning and repurposing of its oldest power station Komati in Mpumalanga, with the help […]
News in South Africa 24th November: 1. SARB rate hike today: The rand firmed overnight to trade below R17 to the US dollar on Thursday morning – its strongest level since late August. The local currency was trading at R16.93 at around 06:00, buoyed by news out of the US that the Federal Reserve may […]
News in South Africa 21st November: 1. R200bn in infrastructure projects underway: SA’s infrastructure backlog appears to be getting some of the attention it needs. Some 48 strategic infrastructure projects worth R193.4 billion are currently under construction, and projects worth R87.4 billion in the procurement phase, according to Infrastructure SA (ISA), which was established by […]
