Welcome to My Blog
Articles and advice on all things legalSnippet-15
Economy/businessTrendsA rising economic tide? Shakespeare could have been referring to our economy: “There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune…”It has been 14 years since our real economy has had a rising tide – but change is...
Snippet 2024 – 14
Economy/businessTrendsBusiness appears to anticipate a repo rate cut in September by our Reserve Bank. Strangely, the Bank of America reportedly expects our Reserve Bank to start cutting interest rates soon – by 25 basis points at each of its following four...
Snippet 13 – 2024
Economy/businessTrendsThe IMF predicts a slowdown of the world economy to 3.2% – KPMG estimates a slowing to 2.5%. Our economy shrank marginally by 0.1% from the expected 0.7% to 0.6% growth in the first quarter of this year – the IMF predicts our growth for the year...
Snippet 2024 – 12
Economy/business Trends Our inflation rate seems to be abating with food prices especially having taken a significant turn for the better. The Reserve Bank governor reiterated an intent to lower our inflation rate (some 5.2% in May) to a midpoint average of 4.5. The...
Snippet 2024 – 11
Economy/business Trends: An economic inflection point? From a BusinessTech talk on change, I learnt that from 30 years ago, some 75% of the then JSEs biggest businesses, have not survived. 85% of those then big businesses, have fallen out of the JSE top 100 listed...
Snippet 2024 – 10
Economy/business Trends: Our economy contracted ever so slightly in the first quarter, but there is hope: the predictions are that our economy will pick up in the second half of the year, with Nedbank predicting a 0.9% GDP growth for this year.The SARB business cycle...
Snippet 2024 – 9
Business Trends: Our SARB Governor says that our economy is not growing – at 0.6% growth thus far this year – and our living standards are falling. Taking inflation into account it is said that South Africans now earn on average what we did in 2006. Growth is limited...
Snippet 2024 – 8
Economy/business Trends: The first quarter, economically speaking, has come and gone. Data from Stats SA show a steep drop in manufacturing output, primarily owing to a steep decline in the production of motor vehicles and accessories. Unfortunately, this decline is...
Snippet 2024 – 7
Practice News: RAF (en route to newsmaker of the year) The RAF has a backlog of 321000 claims. The application to review the AG’s disclaimer of the RAF’s 20/21 annual financial results, has been set aside.The RAF reacted to this judgement by stating that the court had...
Snippet 2024 – 6
Business Economic trends (grim and getting worse): Our economic growth is painfully slow (the World Cup bank is optimistic in setting a recovering growth rate edging to 1%) With inflation edging up towards the 6% the upper range target of the Reserve Bank is a portend...
Snippet 2024 – 5
Business Trends: Our SARB Governor says that our economy is not growing – at 0.6% growth thus far this year – and our living standards are falling.Taking inflation into account it is said that South Africans now earn on average what we did in 2006. Growth is limited...
Snippet 2024 – 4
Economy/business Trends: Inflation is easing (The Shisa Njama index says so!) but our consumers are not generally in great shape.Consensus holds that the first six months of this financial year will be much like the end of last year – we had narrowly escaped...
Snippet 2024 – 3
Business and economy The good news (ignoring angst): The inclusion of this portion of my newsletter was prompted by my perception, 28 years ago, that most attorneys are ignorant of business principles and the economy that underlies business. I suspect that times may...
Snippet 2024 – 2
Business Trends: The Reserve Bank six-month business cycle indicator has contracted for the first time since May, which points to an economic decline in the months to come. Eina! Our Rand exchange rate weakened on (so say the learned ones) the back of investors...
Snippet 2024 – 1
Economy and business Trends: The UN says that our estimated growth for this year will be only 0.5%. Interestingly, it warns against debt sustainability, with 18 African countries recording debt-to-GDP ratios of over 70% – we are there! Inflation: our inflation edged...
Snippet 2023 – 21
Economy & Business; Trends: The ABSA PMI for Q3 was downbeat with October at 45.4 (where 50 is neutral). Similarly, it’s Business Confidence index stood at 31 points. Not much good in this. However, there is some good news: The AG reported a noticeable improvement in...
Snippet 2023 – 20
Economy & Business; Trends: Hearteningly, there appears to be green shoots in what had been rather dismal financial predictions of late. Y-o-y private sector capital expenditure in the last quarter is up by almost a third, FDI has been boosted by our clean-tech drive,...
Snippet 2023 – 19
Economy & Business; MTBPS Budget: Our Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement has come and gone and there is little to be said about our economy which is not common news. The following is our Finance Minister’s part-solution to the problem: “We propose a strategy of...
