BizNews Radio (OLD)
Welcome to BizNews Radio where we interview top thought leaders and business people from South Africa and across the globe.
PIC dismissal Ayo-linked; Tesla surprise; Clicks growth; VW Uitenhage off-grid; SA business ease slips; Don’t mention Harvard
In today's business news headlines: The Public Investment Corporation has dismissed a portfolio manager linked to the R4.3bn investment in Ayo Technology Solutions. Tesla gained as much as 20% after it posted its first quarterly profit in almost a year. The Clicks Group reported a 16.8% rise in full-year earnings…
DA leader quits; Inflation down, SOEs fail audits; ABB flags Eskom payments, Putin eyes Africa; flights resume.
In today's business headlines: The DA leader Mmusi Maimane has quite the party saying the DA is no longer the party of his vision. Soon after the party's chairperson Athol Trollip also decided to pack it in. The party will meet today to discuss the way ahead. South Africa’s…
Helen Zille 'shocked' by Maimane and other resignations
Helen Zille's return to the Democratic Alliance was always going to be contentious. Known for her controversial tweets about colonialism, she stepped aside as leader of the DA to make way for Mmusi Maimane. But she was never far from the spotlight and became known for her tempestuous relationships with…
Maimane's valedictory speech as leaderless DA also lose Trollip
When the Democratic Alliance did not perform as expected in the May 2019 elections; the party was looking for somebody to blame. The party lost supporters to the Freedom Front Plus and could not grow their support among urban blacks ending 2% down from its 2014 results. The spotlight was…
Taxpayers give Eskom R54bn; Deloitte in corruption scandal; DA implodes; SA's Tencent tourism deal; airline groundings; Pick n Pay
Taxpayers are to fund another R54bn to bail out Eskom. The Special Appropriation Bill will see the government give the troubled power utility R26bn in the year through March and R33 bn the following year, according to Bloomberg. Eskom wants Deloitte to pay back about R200m after it benefitted from…
Qhubeka helps 100,000 people, mostly pupils to own a bike – Anthony Fitchenry
Qhubeka has a noble mission - to put every school kid in the country on a bicycle. In a country where it is estimated that the average pupil spends two hours a day walking to school and back home every single school day; it means that kids have more time…
Ramaphosa says pay up; SA debt crisis; Mashaba quits; Boeing rocked; Pound perks up
President Cyril Ramaphosa has called on citizens to pay their electricity bills. Eskom is owed about R24bn. With the National Treasury’s medium-term budget due for release towards the end of the month, economists in a Bloomberg survey expect a fiscal gap of 6.1% of gross domestic product for this year…
#ImStaying is growing rapidly and wants to create business opportunities
The pessimism in our national psyche has reached epic proportions and yes we do have real issues to worry about; Eskom, the economy and polarisation fuelled by political parties like the Economic Freedom Fighters. The feeling of being “gatvol” is pervasive and is sometimes only lifted in moments when we…
Zille back; More loadshedding? Green energy thumbs-up; PIC on Eskom, Moyo; Brexit; Boks
Helen Zille has been elected as the head of the Democratic Alliance’s Federal Council in a return to a leadership role in the party. The power blackouts that gripped South Africa last week ended on Saturday as Eskom’s power supplies improved, but the utility warned that the shortages may not…
Eskom slashes SA growth; Zim pot smoking hot; investment bankers steal millions; Brexit; Mediclinic
Eskom's blackouts could cost SA R5bn a day, a leading economist has warned. The Zimbabwe government has launched the country's first legal cannabis farm in the Harare Central Prison, but it insists that prisoners won't get a whiff. The corporate side of corruption in Africa has been laid bare in…
Metaco – a David that won't bend its knee to Comair’s Goliath
What follows in this episode of the Rational Perspective is extraordinary. Not just because of what Metaco’s MD Barbara Walsh and her colleagues are experiencing. Unfortunately, blatant abuse of power by big businesses occurs far too often - but because of advertising muscle, far too many of these stories get…
Eskom power cuts rand - junk status warning; Zim dark days; retail sales; Mediclinic boost; Brexit tensions
Loadshedding was the big story of the day on Wednesday, with the rand weakening as Eskom, the state-owned South African utility that provides about 95% of the nation’s power, said it would cut 2,000 megawatts of electricity from the national grid because of a shortage of generation capacity, reports Bloomberg…
Property sales perk up; PIC cleans up act; 570% Inflation shocks Zim; EOH blacklists 50 companies; Sasol faces JSE suspension
South Africa’s residential property market has taken strain along with the country’s economy. But, the latest FNB Property Barometer suggests that the housing market could soon take a turn for the better. The Public Investment Corporation, Africa’s biggest fund manager, is cleaning up its act following a series of controversial…
Meet Ryk Neethling: Swimming champ who fell for Val de Vie
I first encountered Val de Vie a couple years ago, a fleeting visit as part of a roadshow with the top team at PPS who were launching a new short-term insurance business. Commitments like those are always time constrained, but such was the magnificence of that estate that I make…
Cyril's gifts to SA business; tourism boost: scrapping birth certificate red tape; property e-deeds; 5 Eskom fixes; Brexit rocks pound
President Cyril Ramaphosa has wowed the investment community with a series of planned reforms aimed at lowering the cost of doing business and increasing interest in South African goods and services. The controversial requirement for travellers to have unabridged birth certificates for all children is widely expected to be scrapped…
Biznews Confidential : The secret sauce of business (and life)
Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett. The late Steve Jobs and his wife Laurene. In this episode of Biznews Confidential, Alec Hogg explains why successful partnerships are the secret sauce of business - and life.
LISTEN: CR's London bombshell: State Capture cost SA a trillion rand
After his opening address at the FT's sixth annual Africa Summit in London this morning, SA president Cyril Ramaphosa dropped a bombshell. During a short interview with the FT's editor Lionel Barber, he was asked whether reports of R500bn lost to State Capture were accurate. After castigating the supposedly reputable…
Dave King banned; CR, JPR in London spotlight; Zuma on trial; China wins in trade war
South African Dave King has been hit with a four year ban by the UK’s Takeover Panel. The two most powerful South Africans, president Cyril Ramaphosa and business tycoon Johann Rupert, will be in the global spotlight today at the Financial Times’s 6th annual Africa Summit in London. The Wall…
World closes in on Guptas – Lord Robin Renwick
South Africans have long been wondering why the Guptas were allowed to continue living lavishly and flaunting expensive weddings overseas with the taxpayers money that they extracted from their lucrative contracts with corrupt officials from the Zuma era. From their Saxonwold lair they decamped to a R445m mansion in Dubai…
US blacklists Guptas; Power stations not for sale; Factory output shrinks; Cell C asset sale; Pathway to Brexit deal
In today's business headlines: The US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has sanctioned Ajay, Atul and Rajesh Gupta as well as Salim Essa for their involvement in corruption in South Africa. President Cyril Ramaphosa has poured cold water on proposals by Finance Minister Tito Mboweni that Eskom would…