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Thursday 30th of November 2017 |
Morning Africa |
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If you are tracking the NSE Do it via RICHLIVE and use Mozilla Firefox as your Browser. 0930-1500 KENYA TIME Normal Board - The Whole shebang Prompt Board Next day settlement Expert Board All you need re an Individual stock.
The Latest Daily PodCast can be found here on the Front Page of the site http://www.rich.co.ke
Macro Thoughts |
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27-NOV-2017 :: Bitcoin "Wow! What a Ride!" @TheStarKenya Africa |
1. Long BITCOIN. 2. Long BITCOIN short Gold
Bitcoin started the year just above $1,000, and the overall growth now is approaching 900 percent. The cryptocurrency’s market capitalization has reached $145 billion [the total crypto currency market cap has soared to almost $275 billion]. Bitcoin is more valuable than major corporations like Siemens, Mastercard, British American Tobacco or McDonald’s. BITCOIN has been the top-performing currency every year since 2010, except 2014 and this Year at +900% the return has been parabolic [off the charts]. The Parabola was described thus by Thomas Pynchon
“But it is a curve each of them feels, unmistakably. It is the parabola. They must have guessed, once or twice -guessed and refused to believe -that everything, always, collectively, had been moving toward that purified shape latent in the sky, that shape of no surprise, no second chance, no return.’’
If you spend Your life deeply immersed in the markets, then it is necessary to sniff out these parabolic moves. And its Better to do Right than Say right as Edwin Lefevre noted nearly a century ago.
Or as T.S Eliot said in The Hollow Men
Between the idea And the reality Between the motion And the act Falls the Shadow For Thine is the Kingdom
Lets return to the subject at hand. On the 3rd of March this year, the Price of #Bitcoin crossed the Gold price for the first time ever [refer my Trade 2. for the year]. Bitcoin hit $1,900 on 22nd May and $2900 on 7th June. In September Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan briefly stemmed its rise when he said 'you can't have a business where people can invent a currency out of thin air'. By 1st November, Bitcoin was surging again after the Chicago Mercantile Exchange announced the launch of Bitcoin Futures contracts. On November 8th, 'Buy Bitcoin' Overtook 'Buy Gold' as an Online Search Phrase. As I file this report on Sunday morning [and the grass is a luscious green after the short rains, outside my window], Bitcoin is all set to burst through $9,000,00. The value of the second largest cryptocurrency Ethereum also smashed an all-time high of $485 on Saturday. Ethereum’s market capitalization is approaching $46 billion, and its gains this year have reached 5,000 percent. At the start of 2017, you could buy one token for $8.27, about 58 times less than the current price. This, you will agree, is mind-boggling inflation. In my experience, when I have found myself riding a Tiger by its Tail, the key issue is the getting off and not trying to run the Trade for every penny. I got off this Tiger. Interestingly, Bitcoin traded as high as $13,499.00 in Zimbabwe last week, but that speaks to the complete dislocation of that economy.
Mr. Novogratz who has raised $500m for a Crypto currency Fund said, "Bitcoin has value because people say it has value." and "Bitcoin you can look at as digital gold." Mr. Gartman said on bitcoin: "this is a market for criminals and millennials" Th mining of bitcoins now uses more electricity than Ireland or Nigeria. Our Central Bank Dr. Njoroge said he thinks bitcoin a pyramid scheme JP Morgan's Jamie Dimon called bitcoin a "fraud" in September and said it "won't end well." The Guardian spoke about the 8 fold price inflation and pronounced
''Since it is only widely used as a currency in drug deals or for ransom payments, there is either a huge boom in criminal activities outside the world of cryptocurrencies, or one within unregulated exchanges where these tokens are traded''
''One of the few men to get out in time before the Wall Street crash of 1929 did so – legend has it – because he was offered a stock tip by the boy who shined his shoes. He immediately sold all his holdings. If the mania for gambling on the stock market had reached down to the children on the streets, the bubble must have been due to pop at any moment. The corresponding moment for the cryptocurrency bubble will only be discernible in retrospect, but we have some pretty strong candidates already. The endorsement of one project by the reality TV star Paris Hilton has already happened''
There are many cryptocurrency schemes which are sold on the same grounds as the greatest South Sea Bubble prospectus: “For carrying on an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to know what it is.”
My Investment Thesis at the start of the year was that Bitcoin was going to get main-streamed in 2017. It has main-streamed beyond my wildest dreams, therefore, I am now sidelined.
Let me leave you with Hunter S. Thompson '' “Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!”
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Emmanuel Macron speaks at Ouagadougou University on Nov. 28. Photographer: Ludovic Marin/AFP/Getty Images Law & Politics |
French President Emmanuel Macron used a speech to African students to put economic development, culture and education on the same level of importance as the terrorism and migration challenges that dominated his predecessors’ relations with the continent.
In a speech of almost two hours to a boisterous crowd of students at Ouagadougou University in Burkina Faso, the 39-year-old president laid out his African policy, insisting that France’s colonial past should no longer color relations given that both he and his audience had never experienced colonialism.
“I’m from a generation that doesn’t tell Africa what to do: I have come to listen,” Macron said, adding that Nelson Mandela’s 1994 election in South Africa was a seminal moment of his youth. “France has a historical link to Africa, Africa is engraved in French history, culture and identity. There were faults and crimes, there were happy moments, but our responsibility is to not be trapped in the past.”
He promised that France’s development aid will reach 0.55 percent of economic output by the end of his first five-year term, up from about 0.4 now, and said it would be better spent. “Sometimes aid hasn’t gone to what’s needed, and instead has served just to please governments, French and African,” he said to cheers from the students.
Macron was born in 1977. Most French colonies in Africa obtained independence from 1960, though successive French governments kept close ties, often intervening militarily to keep friendly regimes in power.
Students laughed Tuesday when Macron mentioned demographics as a challenge facing Africa. “To not talk about it would be irresponsible,” he said, noting that 70 percent of the continent’s population is under 30 years of age. “It’s a huge opportunity, and I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t, but it’s also a huge responsibility. We need this debate.”
Conclusions
reconfiguring the Narrative in a new post colonial World where probably 90% of Africans were born after the colonial struggle.
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Angola's president picks apart Dos Santos empire Africa |
“No one will be above the law . . . I will be the only president,” he said, although few took him seriously. But they were mistaken, because as soon as he took the reins of the south-western African nation, Lourenco kicked off a raft of appointments.
Within a few weeks, the bosses loyal to Dos Santos heading critical institutions and sectors — including the central bank, oil, diamond industry and the media — were replaced by allies of the new leader.
“Joao Lourenco is setting up his team,” the journalist and opponent Rafael Marques said. “What is out of the ordinary is that he is demonstrating that he is the president, not the MPLA (People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola),” the ruling party since independence in 1975. The police and the army did not escape the clear-out either.
Before retiring, Dos Santos took care to freeze by law the hierarchy of the security forces for several years. But Lourenco replaced the chiefs of police and military intelligence anyway.
“He’s tearing up the original compromise government that he negotiated with Dos Santos around the time of his inauguration as head of state,” said Alex Vines, an analyst at the British think tank Chatham House. He has demonstrated that the dos Santos family is no longer protected.”
Conclusions
Vow. The Speed of the Dos Santos unravelling. Lourenco is burning the ground under his Feet.
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Zimbabwe's President Sets 90-Day Deadline to Return Stolen Cash Africa |
“Huge sums of money and other assets” have been taken by “certain individuals and corporates,” Mnangagwa said in a statement Tuesday without naming them. He urged those responsible for “a very serious economic crime against the people of Zimbabwe” to act before the end of the period, which starts Dec. 1, “to avoid the pain and ignominy of being visited by the long arm of the law.”
The street price of hard currency in Zimbabwe has dropped more than 30 percent since Mugabe’s ouster. One U.S. dollar cost the equivalent of $1.30 in Zimbabwean bond notes on the black market on Tuesday, down from $1.90 on Nov. 20, according to street traders who quoted prices to Bloomberg.
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Tanzania opposition leader blames president after shooting Africa |
Seconds after two armed men leapt from a car that had been following Tundu Lissu for three weeks, the Tanzanian opposition leader was being thrown to the floor by his driver as they sought to survive a hail of bullets.
“All hell broke loose,” says Mr Lissu, chief whip of the Chadema party. “I have been told, because I couldn’t count, that 38 bullets hit my car and out of those something like 16 hit me.”
Speaking in his first interview since the attack outside his flat in the capital Dodoma in September, Mr Lissu, one of the most vocal critics of the government, believes he was the target of an assassination attempt. And he blames president John Magufuli, alleging that it is evidence of what the opposition leader describes as a campaign to turn “the country into a dictatorship”.
“He [Magufuli] wants to crush the political parties, crush the press, crush organised civil society and the trade union and silence the church,” Mr Lissu told the Financial Times in Kenya, where he is receiving medical treatment. “Every independent centre of power should be made to comply with the demands of the big man.”
Assassinations are rare in the east African nation and the president described the attack on Mr Lissu as “barbaric”. The police have announced no progress in the investigation despite the attack taking place in a compound that Mr Lissu says was equipped with CCTV.
Hassan Abbas, a government spokesman, says Mr Lissu’s allegations are “misplaced”.
“If anyone, including Mr Lissu, has any further evidence let him share [it] with investigators,” Mr Abbas says. “Tanzania is known for its unmatched peaceful and democratic political processes which are conducted according to the laws.”
But the allegations against the president come as he faces mounting criticism for stifling democratic debate.
Zitto Kabwe, leader of the opposition Alliance for Change and Transparency party, was arrested four weeks ago for questioning official macroeconomic statistics; the electoral commission has banned discussion of national issues during campaigning for 43 council by-elections on Sunday; and four newspapers have been shut in recent months for criticising the president.
“By his own admission [Mr Magufuli] doesn’t believe in multi-party democracy,” Mr Kabwe says. “He sees parties as annoyances, including his own party. He wants to rule with no encumbrances. He prefers to rule in an autocratic way.”
The motive for the attack on Mr Lissu was “to keep us quiet”, Mr Kabwe adds.
Mr Magufuli, whose nickname is “The Bulldozer”, came to power two years ago promising to stamp out endemic corruption and drive economic growth. He has been widely praised, including by Mr Lissu, for clamping down on graft but strongly criticised for what his opponents say are autocratic tendencies.
Mr Lissu, who has been charged six times this year — including with sedition — after criticising Mr Magufuli, says he survived the shooting because the bullets missed his torso and “hit me on the backside big time”. He has had 12 operations and is still bed-ridden but can sit up.
“He’s managed to beat us up real bad,” he says, referring to the president’s crackdown on dissent. “The way Magufuli is, his temperament, his personality, his recent actions, he’s turning the country into a dictatorship.
“But we have one ace; he’s so good at making enemies. He’s made enemies with everyone. And we can use this against him.”
Mr Lissu says the opposition was also benefiting from “Magunomics”, his description for the president’s economic policies.
“He’s trying to take us back to the 1960s, 70s and 80s when the government would control every productive activity,” says Mr Lissu, who is also president of the Tanganyika Law Society. “The private sector has suffered so much under him.”
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South African Rand Surges as Traders Cheer Respite From Moody's @business Africa |
South Africa’s rand is living up to its reputation as the world’s most volatile currency.
Having been dealt what should have been a crippling blow by S&P Global Ratings on Friday, sparking a 2 percent slump, the currency advanced as much as 3.3 percent on Monday, on track for its best day since December 2015, after Moody’s Investors Service retained its investment-grade rating on the nation’s local-currency debt.
The reprieve by Moody’s meant South Africa retains its position in Citigroup Inc.’s World Government Bond Index for now, even though the company said it may cut the assessment after the February budget. An exit from the index would spark forced selling of local bonds by investors that track the gauge, leading to outflows of much as $10 billion, according to Societe Generale SA.
“I’m really surprised” by the rand’s gains, said Arnaud Masset, a market analyst at Swissquote Bank SA. “Moody’s decision to hold fire offset, somehow, the negative signal sent by S&P.”
Options traders pruned their short-term pessimism on the South African unit as it rebounded. The rand’s expected swings against the dollar, based on one-week and two-week contracts, fell by the most since 2006. It was heading for the first close stronger than its 50-day moving average since Oct. 13.
The currency strengthened 3.2 percent to 13.7140 per dollar as of 3:52 p.m. in Johannesburg. Local-currency bonds due December 2026 gained, with the yield falling 12 basis points to 9.22 percent, after increasing as much as eight basis points earlier.
“I think this reaction is very much in line with our predictions, in the event of one agency cutting the ratings,” said Cristian Maggio, head of emerging-markets research at the Toronto-Dominion Bank. “Although, I must admit, it’s even faster than I would have expected.”
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Kenya is seeking proposals from banks about a possible $2 billion Eurobond offering in the first quarter of 2018 Kenyan Economy |
Yields on Kenya’s existing $2 billion of Eurobonds due June 2024 traded three basis points lower at 5.74 percent by 3:52 p.m. in the capital, Nairobi, on Monday.
Rotich said in May the government intended to use part of the proceeds of the Eurobond sale to repay a $750 million syndicated loan owed to banks including Citigroup Inc., Standard Bank Ltd. and Standard Chartered Plc. The government earlier this month asked for an extension on the repayment of the bulk of the loan until April. In 2014, Kenya extended the maturity of another syndicated loan by three months as it awaited better conditions to issue its debut Eurobond.
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Centum Investment Company reports H1 2017 EPS -19.455% Earnings here Kenyan Economy |
Par Value: 0.50/- Closing Price: 43.00 Total Shares Issued: 665441775.00 Market Capitalization: 28,613,996,325 EPS: 10.93 PE: 3.934
Centum Investment Company PLC HY 2018 Results through 30th September 2018 vs. 30th September 2017 HY Sales 4.772045b vs. 4.121865b +15.774% HY Direct and other operating costs [4.223126b] vs. [3.619903b] +16.664% HY Trading profit 548.919m vs. 501.962m +9.355% HY Income from financial services 1.585604b vs. 2.422458b -34.546% HY Funding and other costs [1.697086b] vs. [1.851163b] -8.323% HY Operating [Loss]/ profit from financial services [111.482b] vs. 571.295m -119.514% HY Investment and other income 2.231220b vs. 1.932971b +15.430% HY Operating and administrative costs [524.583m] vs. [250.177m] +109.685% HY Finance costs [557.253m] vs. [354.536m] +57.178% HY Share of profits from associates and joint ventures 568.236m vs. 345.651m +64.396% HY Profit/ [Loss] before tax 2.166518b vs. 2.760161b -21.508% HY Profit/ [Loss] after tax 1.631416b vs. 2.057886b -20.724% EPS 2.07 vs. 2.57 -19.455% Total Assets 91.909b Total Equity 50.604b NAV 69.74 HY Closing cash and cash equivalents 4.921b vs. 5.639b -12.733%
Conclusions
On a Trailing PE of less than 4, this is a cheap share.
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