Airline gets wings, retail is grounded
LOW-cost airline FlySafair‚ which had its wings clipped in October for failing to meet restrictions on foreign ownership‚ was granted a domestic scheduled passenger licence by the Air Services Licensing Council. SOUTH Africa’s Sibanye Gold aimed to make a “material” acquisition in the strikehit platinum mining industry by the end of this year as it sought to diversify its business, CEO Neal Froneman said. WHOLESALE trade sales rose 8.9% year on year in February, compared with 8.7% year on year in January‚ Stats SA said on Thursday. Seasonally adjusted wholesale trade sales increased by 1.1% compared with January 2014. INVESTMENT holding company PSG Group posted a 14% rise in fullyear recurring headline earnings a share to 446.9c, boosted in part by “exceptional” earnings growth from PSG Konsult and strong growth from Capitec. TRANSNET has applied for a licence to generate electricity and plans to regenerate 38MW by 2017‚ mostly using the technology of its new locomotives. It will need as much as 66% more energy to implement its expansion plans. SOUTH Africa’s retail sales grew by a lower than expected 2.2% year on year in February, compared with a revised 6.4% in January, Stats SA data showed. On a month-on-month basis, sales fell 0.2%. BREWER SABMiller posted a modest rise in full-year lager sales volumes following troubles in some African markets that have been fuelling growth for the past few years. It reported overall sales volume growth of 2%. THE seasonally adjusted trade activity index fell one point to 50 in March. the SA Chamber of Commerce and Industry said, although a “marginally improved” business climate helped to keep conditions in positive territory. OLD Mutual Investment Group SA revised its economic growth forecast for South Africa to 2.5% in 2014 from 2.7%, citing strikes in platinum mining‚ little spending growth and a slow pick-up in the global economy. TELKOM CEO Sipho Maseko faces referral to the national prosecutor or a fine if he fails to attend a corporate governance course as ordered after a loan to Telkom’s CFO was judged to have breached corporate rules.