Star 2024-10-11

ABOUT R1.8 billion is being invested into a ferro manganese production along South Africa’s mineral plush Bushveld Complex as investors tap into alluring opportunities for the metal. This follows the signing of a binding agreement by Khwelamet, a subsidiary of Khwela Capital, which is jointly owned by Menar Capital and Ntiso Investment Holdings, to fully acquire Samancor’s Metalloys manganese alloy smelter in Gauteng. Vuslat Bayoglu, the managing director of Menar, told Business Report this week that the completion of the transaction was subject to regulatory approvals. “We intend to invest around R1.8bn in the project. The decision was driven by a careful assessment of the markets and available opportunities for growth,” said Bayoglu. He added that acquisition of the Samancor facility gave Menar and its partner significant options in the…

A month-long collaborative pilot with transporters has seen the Durban Container Terminal Pier 2 improve its truck turnaround time by 24%. The new truck booking solution to manage the flow of trucks into the terminal will remain in order to improve and sustain the availability of slots at the terminal. Managing xxecutive at the Durban Terminals, Earle Peters said:“The terminal now releases available truck booking slots 60 hours in advance compared to the previous 24 hours. Landside operations have a dedicated fleet of 16 straddle carriers, and the new equipment that keeps coming will only enhance the solution we have agreed on with transporters.” He added that transporters with import container releases of at least 50 containers per transporter per vessel are not required to make any bookings for evacuation.…

The tide is turning for South African investment, experts at the Think Investing Convention 2024 held at the JSE said yesterday. They agreed it was time for South African markets to thrive, not strive, with higher returns on local equities versus US equities. Tobie van Heerden, the CEO of 10X Investments, comparing the local asset management industry to the Springboks’ performance in the Rugby World Cup, shared the analogy of how the team was winning by one point in games and just surviving, but it came out the other side and was now thriving. Now too was the time for local markets to thrive, he said. South Africa’s elections and the Government of National Unity (GNU) was a turning point for the country as regards investment, according to Van Heerden.…

Kganyago explains reluctance to cut rates aggressively after prolonged high South African Reserve Bank (SARB) Governor Lesetja Kganyago has maintained that the interest rates cutting cycle in the country will continue to be dictated by “domestic idiosyncrasies” in spite of emerging markets’ central banks cutting rates. The SARB last month decided to cut the borrowing costs by 25 basis points, from 8.25% to 8.00% per annum, for the first time in four years after interest rates remained elevated at a 14-year high for a prolonged period of time. The SARB was encouraged by headline consumer inflation declining to 4.4% in September, below the 4.5% midpoint of its 3% to 6% target range. Presenting the SARB’s annual report before the standing committee on finance in Parliament yesterday, Kganyago maintained that the…

I could fill this column with numbers and statistics, detailing the positive trajectory of South Africa’s economy. And it’s easy enough to do. However, the promise displayed in the numbers needs to be cemented, and that can only happen through collective action from all of us. Everything from consumer confidence to gross domestic growth has improved. Consumer confidence is at a five-year high, business confidence is growing, with respondents in the RMB/Bureau for Economic Research index expecting conditions to improve over the next year – the first time in just more than two-and-a-half years. Business activity, according to S&P, expanded for the first time since August 2023. The economy is growing, although the rate is tepid, to be generous. The Merchantec CEO Confidence Index, which measures confidence levels of CEOs…

South Africa is making progress towards tightening lax Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and Counter-Terrorist Financing (CFT) controls towards the end of exiting the Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF’s) greylist. However, it seems unlikely that the government, banks, and other regulated entities will have done enough to get the country off the greylist by the time of the FATF’s January 2025 meeting. Following the greylisting in February 2023, South Africa committed to working with FATF to overcome its shortfalls. Included in an eight-step process were requirements to strengthen legal enforcement utilising data from the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) and to introduce more effective measures to identify and implement sanctions. On the upside, progress has been made towards meeting the FATF’s list of action points relating to targeted financial sanction regimes and legal…