BusinessLIVE - For Your Ear

Benchmark rates, including in SA. get reformed & renamed

A couple of years ago, on Creative Concern’s website, Klaus Schwab stated that “the trends that are shaping the 21st century embody both promise and peril”. Today, most focus seems to be on the peril, and daily academic research headlines confirm this. On the promise side there have been positive…

9 Aug 2020 1AM 6 min

Transferring a football club and its players falls within the Labour Relations Act

Professional football players and coaches in the Premier Soccer League (PSL) or GladAfrica Championship (GAC) have reason to cry foul if their clubs are sold and they are sidelined because the new owners cannot afford their salaries. They are employees, and unless they gave their prior consent to being left…

9 Aug 2020 1AM 3 min

Denel misses court-imposed deadline to pay salaries

State arms manufacturer Denel has missed a court-imposed deadline to pay all staff their outstanding salaries, pension contributions, insurance and other outstanding payments. Since May, some staff have received as little as 20% of their salary with others getting up to 60% of salaries in June and July. Most medical…

7 Aug 2020 10AM 1 min

SSA to start lifestyle audits in Gauteng amid PPE tender saga

The State Security Agency (SSA) will begin conducting lifestyle audits on members of Gauteng’s cabinet, including premier David Makhura, from next week. While Makhura announced in his state of the province address last year that the provincial executive council would be subjected to these audits, this has not taken place…

7 Aug 2020 9AM 2 min

Covid resurgence slows US job growth in July

Washington — US employment growth slowed considerably in July amid a resurgence in new Covid-19 infections, offering the clearest evidence yet that the economy’s recovery from the recession caused by the pandemic was faltering. Nonfarm payrolls increased by 1.763-million jobs in July after a record 4.791-million in June, the labour…

7 Aug 2020 9AM 2 min

Gauteng’s Covid-19 situation improves, but Makhura says worst could still come

The Gauteng provincial government will battle the Covid-19 pandemic as though the peak of virus could still hit the country’s economic hub, despite the number of active cases steadily declining over the past few weeks. Gauteng premier David Makhura said in a media briefing on Friday that it is good…

7 Aug 2020 8AM 3 min

Tito Mboweni grants municipalities more time to submit financial statements

Finance minister Tito Mboweni has granted SA’s beleaguered municipalities and local government entities an exemption from legally prescribed deadlines to submit their financials for auditing, as a result of the national state of disaster and the coronavirus lockdown. The exemption from certain requirements of the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA),…

7 Aug 2020 8AM 2 min

Devastated Beirut unlikely to be rebuilt as costs put at $15bn

Beirut — Beirut residents began trying to rebuild their shattered lives on Friday after the biggest blast in the Lebanese capital’s history tore into the city, killing at least 154 and leaving the heavily indebted nation with another huge reconstruction bill. The search for those missing since Tuesday’s blast intensified…

7 Aug 2020 7AM 4 min

PIC appoints Sholto Dolamo as acting CIO

The Public Investment Corporation (PIC) has appointed Sholto Dolamo its acting chief investment officer (CIO) with effect from August 6. Dolamo is the executive head of research and projects development at the PIC and a member of the its executive committee. “The PIC board took a decision to reinstate several…

7 Aug 2020 7AM 1 min

Mkhwebane admits she had classified IGI report into Sars unit

Public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane’s lawyer has confirmed to the high court that she was in possession of a classified inspector-general of intelligence (IGI) report during her investigation into the “rogue unit”, despite intimating that she had not seen it. Mkhwebane, in her final report, stated she “had it on good…

7 Aug 2020 7AM 3 min

India’s virus-hunting women strike for pay and protection

New Delhi — They helped eradicate polio in India and reduced the number of women dying during child birth. But the country’s catastrophic coronavirus outbreak, now the third-largest in the world, has pushed its all-female army of contact-tracing health workers to breaking point. After months of harassment, underpayment and lack…

7 Aug 2020 6AM 6 min

Schaeffler family fortune plummets on slow vehicle output

London — A lot can happen in two-and-a-half years. In early 2018, Georg Schaeffler became Germany’s richest person as shares of Continental, the car-part maker in which he and his mother — Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler-Thumann — own a major stake, surged in price. At the time, their combined fortune totalled $35bn…

7 Aug 2020 6AM 3 min

Global equities under pressure amid rising US-China tension

London — World stocks ended four days of gains on Friday after US President Donald Trump cranked up simmering tension with China by banning US transactions with two popular Chinese apps, Tencent’s WeChat and ByteDance’s TikTok. Chinese stocks led losers in Asia and its currency slumped after Trump issued the…

7 Aug 2020 5AM 2 min

Oil dips as Covid-19 numbers likely to slow demand recovery

London — Oil dipped to about $45 a barrel on Friday on worries that a demand recovery would slow due to a resurgence of coronavirus cases, though a pledge from oil cartel Opec member Iraq to cut oil output further in August lent support. The resurgence of infections remains a…

7 Aug 2020 5AM 2 min

North Korea hit by floods amid Covid-19 and food shortage

Seoul — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un inspected a rural area hit by flooding as torrential rains threaten to wipe out farmland and deal another blow to a virus-damaged economy set for its biggest contraction in more than two decades. Kim visited Unpha county, about 60km south of the…

7 Aug 2020 5AM 2 min

Covid-19 has left us virtually exhausted

The digital revolution may be convenient and cost-effective, but are we all in danger of online overload, asks Rayner Canning, business development director at the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business (GSB). Everyone meets onscreen these days. Whether it’s boardroom discussions, client meetings, or executive education and MBA…

7 Aug 2020 4AM 4 min

Twitter to label state backed media accounts to create more transparency

San Francisco — Twitter has begun labelling some state-backed media accounts, as well as accounts belonging to “key government officials” for certain countries, to create more transparency when governments and their leaders use the social-media platform to discuss important geopolitical issues, the company said on Thursday. The new policy will…

7 Aug 2020 4AM 2 min

Gold hits new high on soaring Covid-19 cases

Bengaluru — Gold smashed a record high on Friday as a safety rush fuelled by the worsening coronavirus pandemic and its mounting economic toll gathered pace and put bullion on track for its longest weekly winning streak in nearly a decade. Spot gold was up 0.3% at $2,069.78/oz by 3.08am…

7 Aug 2020 2AM 2 min

Lockdown day 133: Latest Covid-19 numbers

Number of Covid-19 infections in SA rises to 538,184, there have been 387,316 recoveries and 9,604 deaths to date

7 Aug 2020 2AM 1 min

US ban of TikTok weighs on Asian markets

Tokyo — Asian shares tumbled on Friday after US President Donald Trump ratcheted up already heightened tension with Beijing by banning US transactions with China’s tech giant Tencent as well as ByteDance, the owner of video-sharing app TikTok. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan lost 1% and Hong…

7 Aug 2020 2AM 4 min