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.
Capital markets practitioners across Africa benefit from a graduate-level programme launched 3 May by the IFC, Milken Institute and George Washington University.
The International Finance Corporation continues its programme of helping develop African debt markets by launching the first bond by a non-resident issuer in Namibia. It raised NAD 180 million (about $12m) which it will use for private sector development.
A dynamic African builder of turnkey commodity exchanges, eleni LLC, has teamed up with pan-African Ecobank to accelerate development of African agriculture.
A public-private partnership consortium, including the Government of Ghana (as minority), local and international investors, aim to finalize fund-raising for a new Ghana Commodity Exchange (GCX) during April and to build the exchange within 12 months.
IFC signed 2 grant agreements with MicroEnsure Ltd for index-based weather insurance to help small-scale farmers in Rwanda and Zambia manage drought and too much rain.
Rift Valley Railways (RVR), a platform company of Egypt’s Citadel Capital, has repaired 500 kilometers of track between Tororo in Eastern Uganda and Gulu in the North, opening north and northwest Uganda South Sudan and eastern Democratic Republic of Congo to rail services after 20 years of disuse and inefficiency.
Today (16 Oct) saw the launch of the African Corporate Governance Network in Mauritius,, with Kenya, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The International Finance Corporation plans to issue a $50 million (NGN 8 billion) local-currency “Naija” bond in Nigeria to support the domestic capital markets and increase access to local-currency finance. IFC bonds are rated triple-A by Moody’s Investors Service and Standard & Poor’s.
The Initial Public Offer by power company Umeme closed on 7 November and results are expected before the listing on 30 November. Before the close, commentators said there was a turnup of applications and that the International Finance Corporation had invested, but parliamentarians called for an inquiry.
The International Finance Corporation (the private sector investment arm of the World Bank group) will invest and mobilize more than $1 billion into private infrastructure in Africa during 2012, up from $200 million 5 years ago.