Hits&Misses

Petra has a gem of a mine but Sibanye burrows into trouble

SA raised $5bn (about R75bn) in its biggest eurobond sale to date, offering returns that compensated investors for increasing risk. The deal was split between a $2bn 10-year tranche and $3bn of 30-year notes, yielding 4.85% and 5.75% respectively. The government had planned a $4bn deal but issued more after the transaction was 2.7 times oversubscribed, it said.

TRADE unions emerged as the big winners after the Competition Tribunal ruled that Clover Industries has to reduce the number of jobs it is cutting as part of an ongoing restructuring. The tribunal also conditionally approved Israeli-led consortium Milco’s acquisition of the group.

PETRA Diamonds found a 20.08-carat blue stone at its flagship mine in SA, offering some relief to a miner struggling with weak demand and a mountain of debt. The gem-quality type IIb diamond was found at its Cullinan mine. THE likelihood of Sibanye-Stillwater, the world’s largest platinum miner, facing another crippling strike increased after it said it would lay off up to 5,270 people at the Lonmin assets it now owns. Sibanye is in wage talks with the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, the dominant union at its Rustenburg mines and those at Lonmin. The potential strike will follow a five-month shutdown of Sibanye’s gold mines by Amcu over wages.

BLUE Label Telecoms said trading losses and debt problems at Cell C helped push it into a R6.6bn loss in the year to end-May, more than double its market capitalisation of R3bn. Blue Label holds a 45% stake in Cell C.

THE Reserve Bank’s composite leading business cycle indicator fell 1.5% year on year in July, extending the losing streak for an important measure of long-term growth to 10 consecutive months.