MTBPS: the deficit is deafening

Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement (MTBPS) – just reading it out loud is more of a mouthful than Finance Minister Tito Mboweni’s finest roast chickens on Twitter. This is different to the annual budget speech which presents the country’s finances for the next financial year. The MTBPS gives context to the budget speech for the forthcoming year, giving the market details …

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Tesla: best quarter in history

Tesla has released its much-anticipated Q3 results. “Alright, so Q3 was our best quarter in history.” Those were the opening words of Elon Musk on the Tesla Q3 earnings call. A sales record combined with free cash flow of $1.4bn is certainly impressive, but as ever I remain concerned about the hype around this company which does not operate in …

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Steinhoff fine: punishing the wrong people

Steinhoff misrepresented its accounts by literally billions of Euros. It was a scandal that rocked the market when it was uncovered in 2017, putting the Christo Wiese empire into a tailspin and sending shockwaves through the accounting profession. Sentiment of entrepreneurs towards listed companies turned sour. If they couldn’t trust the Steinhoff financials, why should they trust the financials of …

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Being listed isn’t always a gas

A listed company, for example on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE), allows its shares to be traded publicly on the exchange. This enables anyone to put in a bid for the shares which could match with an offer from an existing shareholder and… …BINGO magic happens. Shares have been traded, there’s a new shareholder on the shareholder register and the …

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