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EDITORIAL: New tax resistance threat to fragile SA

South Africans — illicit cigarette smugglers, the ANC Women’s League and a smattering of EFF populists aside — may have been united in their delight at moving to a less restrictive level 2 lockdown this week, but that’s probably where the sense of national unity ends. One of the harshest…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 3 min

EDITORIAL: Sasol’s history-making financial disaster

Adherents of the private sector efficiency theory will have been startled to read that the bungling engineers at Sasol turned in an epic R91.3bn loss for the year to March. It not only exceeds SA’s entire loan from the International Monetary Fund and African Development Bank, it leaves state-owned basket…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 1 min

EDITORIAL: Global solidarity on Covid-19 vaccines may be tonic fractured world needs

Future historians may possibly see 2016 as when it started. Some may look back to the middle of 2007, when the collapse of a couple of hedge funds linked to sub-prime events would spark the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression. The great recession and the era of austerity…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 3 min

War for eyeballs hots up in SA’s television industry

SA’s film and television industry has the potential to grow by close to R100bn over the next five years, according to data from consulting firm Accenture. Roman Magis, principal director for video, advertising and content at Accenture Africa, says its research shows that by embracing digital technologies, SA’s broadcasters could…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 5 min

Ron ’n Brian look back on the good old daze

INT. SAXONWOLD SHEBEEN (Somewhere in Saxonwold, Joburg).BRIAN MOLEFE and RONALD REAGAN are seated at the bar, having a drink. The lighting is dim, the atmosphere convivial.REAGAN: You look down, man. What’s up?MOLEFE: Having a bit of trouble remembering things, Ron. Struggled to even find this place this evening.REAGAN: That’s too…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 1 min

Belarus leader orders police to quash protests as EU turns up the heat

Minsk/Brussels — Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko ordered his police on Wednesday to put down protests in the capital, Minsk, signalling an escalation after a week-and-a-half of mass demonstrations against his rule. The EU held an emergency summit on the crisis, rejecting Lukashenko’s re-election in a disputed vote on August 9…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 4 min

World Bank looking to trim poor nations’ debt stock faster

Washington — The World Bank is looking at ways to reduce the amount of debt owed by poor countries — rather than simply delaying payments — to attract more investors in the wake of the global pandemic and recession, president David Malpass said. The coming months and the annual meetings…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 2 min

A good week for Joe Biden

A good week You couldn’t do much better than having Michelle Obama and Bernie Sanders in your corner for the US presidential race. At this week’s Democratic national convention, where Joe Biden is set to be declared the Democrats’ candidate, Sanders declared "the future of democracy" to be at stake…

19 Aug 2020 12PM 1 min

Sierra Leone court freezes Steinmetz’s Octea assets over environmental damage

Freetown — The high court of Sierra Leone, on Wednesday, granted an interim freezing order on the assets of Octea, a subsidiary of Israeli billionaire Beny Steinmetz’s BSG Resources (BSGR) in a lawsuit over alleged environmental damage around Octea’s diamond mine. The lawyer for the plaintiffs had requested a freezing…

19 Aug 2020 11AM 1 min

SIU probes R5bn worth of contracts related to Covid-19

The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) is probing R5bn worth of contracts in its investigation into corruption relating to the measures taken by the state to fight the Covid-19 pandemic. Aside from this, more allegations are continuing to flow to the SIU, its head Andy Mothibi said in parliament on Wednesday…

19 Aug 2020 11AM 3 min

Exporters can no longer ignore their carbon footprint

SA’s economic survival in a post-Covid world depends significantly on trade. However, the ability to trade internationally depends on an enterprise’s compliance with worldwide standards and regulations, which often involve various trade tariffs. As part of a global shift towards climate change action, carbon tariffs on imported goods are in…

19 Aug 2020 11AM 3 min

The case for responsible investment of pension savings in infrastructure

The idea of tapping into pension funds to finance infrastructure development with a view to increasing the productive capacity of the economy and create jobs is neither new nor unique to SA. However, amid a recent resurgence in the debate locally over whether large retirement funds should invest more in…

19 Aug 2020 11AM 5 min

Democrats formally confirm Joe Biden as presidential nominee

Columbus/Washington — Democrats officially nominated Joe Biden for president on Tuesday, culminating in a comeback that made him their choice to take on President Donald Trump with the blessing of the party’s past and future stars. Biden received the 2,374 delegate votes necessary for the nomination at a convention that…

19 Aug 2020 11AM 5 min

Mali’s gold mines still open but shares fall after coup

Johannesburg/London — Gold mining companies in Mali have said they are monitoring the deepening political crisis that hit their share prices on Wednesday. Most said they are operating as usual. President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta resigned on Tuesday and dissolved parliament hours after soldiers detained him at gunpoint and seized power…

19 Aug 2020 10AM 2 min

Market reaction against Tencent a likely overreaction

Tencent, through its holding of WeChat, has been caught up in the escalating China/US trade tensions, which has potential implications for holders of shares in Naspers and Prosus. On August 6 US President Donald Trump issued two executive orders against Chinese tech companies, imposing a ban on US transactions with…

19 Aug 2020 10AM 4 min

I don’t want to talk to China right now, says Donald Trump

Washington/Beijing — US President Donald Trump has said he called off last weekend’s trade talks with China, raising questions about the future of a trade deal that is now the most stable point in an increasingly tense relationship. “I canceled talks with China,” Trump said on Tuesday in Yuma, Arizona…

19 Aug 2020 10AM 3 min

NICOLE FRITZ: Ruling against brave Beatrice Mtetwa invites only outrage

If, in these quasi-apocalyptic times, there were to be a type of Noah’s ark rerun, but instead of saving pairs of animals to repopulate a post-flood earth only the most exceptional representative of every profession and skill set was to be saved for a post-pandemic world, there’d probably be little…

19 Aug 2020 10AM 4 min

From the ashes of Beirut, a museum is in the making

Beirut — Standing in front of the rubble of a house destroyed in Beirut’s port blast, Henry Loussian brushes off the dust and dirt from fragments of its architecture all but lost among a tangle of scaffolding obscuring a grand ceiling and elaborate chandelier. Such heritage houses were once commonplace,…

19 Aug 2020 10AM 2 min

Citigroup’s $900m accidental payment headed for the courts

It will sound familiar. You’re doing an electronic transfer for $10 and just stop short of sending $1,000 by mistake. Sometimes bungled transactions like this go through — but rarely on the scale of last week’s $900m payments blunder by Citigroup, which paid debt investors roughly 100 times more than…

19 Aug 2020 10AM 3 min

Face masks raise intriguing questions around privacy, security, faith and identity

The mandatory wearing of masks in public raises intriguing questions around privacy, profiling, security, and even faith and identity. Countries such as France and Belgium have fought bitter cultural battles for more than a decade over attempts to ban Muslim women from covering their faces in public. While the hijab…

19 Aug 2020 9AM 5 min