News and developments on African capital markets: African securities, African stock exchanges, African equities, African bonds, African private equity/venture capital, and African social impact investment. Twitter @africancapital, LinkedIn African Securities Exchanges group.
The World Bank has announced that it will give a $600m grant and a $600m loan towards supporting reforms in Ethiopia’s financial sector including improving the investment climate, according to Reuters, plus technical support.
A packed room of businesspeople and investors assembled in London on 16 October to hear about opportunities and news at the UK-Ethiopia Trade & Investment Forum 2018. Leader of the delegation was Arkebe Oqubay, Economic Advisor to the Prime Minister, who gave a detailed overview of events of the last 6 months and the big ambitions driving Ethiopia.
9 reasons Africa tops investors’ agenda, Eddy Njoroge told African Securities Exchanges Association, include: economy to rise from $1.1trn to $3.9trn in 5 years, the fastest-growing middle class (from 123m to 1.1bn), population to double to 2.4bn, and record $80bn of foreign investment.
The World Bank has cut its growth forecast for sub-Saharan Africa. Earlier in the year it forecast 5.2% growth overall for SSA economies in 2012, but yesterday (4 Oct) it cut this to 4.8%.
Strong growth in new projects into Africa is expected from 2012 with foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows forecast to reach US$150 billion by 2015, says top consulting and auditing firm Ernst & Young.