LATEST ON BIZNEWS RADIO iTunes: Students develop solar train as rail transport falters (Click here for Spotify)
LATEST ON BIZNEWS.COM:
- PANDA undresses Covid-19’s ‘Slim Karim’
- Q&A with 36ONE asset manager Cy Jacobs – on performance fees, crypto and flexible investing
- Sean Peche: Applying Buffettology 101 and Level Two thinking – If you can’t buy UK companies now, you never will.
- Cofesa has the way forward all mapped out
- Phalatse’s last-ditch attempt to wrestle power back from ANC
- MAILBOX: The DA should revise its Covid jab policy
- Big Agriculture isn’t concerned with the toxicity in our food
- Students develop solar train as rail transport falters
- Brand SA to host the 6th Annual Nation Brand Forum aimed at rebuilding the economy
- DA to fight the capture of Knysna in court
- Helen Zille on WC’s push for greater self-rule: Time is ripe, Pretoria’s failing state on full display
- Anglo signs memorandum for green power in SA
- “South Africa is at a turning point” – Q&A with RW Johnson
- Landmark $8.5bn climate finance deal hangs in the balance (Premium)
- Boardroom Talk: Warning for SA as most Brazilians want openly corrupt President Lula back in office (Premium)
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I really enjoyed yesterday’s monthly catch-up on the Corion Report with David Bacher (yes, cricketer Ali’s son). Apart from sharp declines in stock prices worldwide during what David described in our interview as a “brutal” September, two other things jumped out for me.
First was the month’s huge outflows for the Coronation and Allan Gray Balanced funds (R600m and R500m respectively) whose excessive fees and poor performance had been highlighted on BizNews by financial whistleblower Sean Peche. His conclusions were clearly taken very seriously indeed by some investors.
The other was the way Corion quantified loadshedding over the past four years. In 2019, it reports, Eskom staged 534 hours of blackouts on SA. That rose 58% to 844 hours in 2021 and a further 37% to 1153 hours last year. For 2022 so far, we’re already at a new peak of 1950 hours, up 69% on 2021’s all-time high.
Put differently, SA has suffered electricity blackouts for 81 of the 277 days so far this year. That’s one day in every three. Another poisonous gift courtesy of ANC cadre deployment and ANC socialist ideology which legislated, until very recently, that only the state monopoly could produce and distribute electricity. If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.
After September’s near double digit average drop in stock prices around the world (including the JSE which lost 9% in Dollar terms), investors are justifiably nervous as the fourth quarter of 2022 begins. Corion’s David Bacher, however, offers some positive suggestions – specifically on South African financial and resources shares which he reckons offer value, especially relative to offshore alternatives. A realist, Bacher remains cautious about local economic prospects, but says valuations are just so low that avoiding these stocks would be a mistake. On the other hand, he is staying away from offshore stocks, especially in the US, where the Bear’s Grip is tightening.
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