Category: Semafor

South Africa’s oil importation bill could have been $4.7 billion lower if it had not closed a number of refineries, the country’s central bank said. Refining capacity in Africa’s largest economy has halved over the past decade and imported refined fuel now supplies more than half of domestic demand, the ...

The Gambia banned protests without permits following days of unrest over persistent electricity blackouts. The crackdown — which included police firing tear gas at demonstrators — comes ahead of December’s general election in which President Adama Barrow will seek a controversial third term. The country’s electricity problems have surged in ...

, directed by Antonin Baudry. The two-part historical saga follows Charles de Gaulle’s role in the French resistance during World War II. The film picks up in 1940 after France’s defeat by the Nazis and chronicles de Gaulle’s efforts to show the Allies that France was still worth fighting for. ...

Sweden’s center-left opposition appeared poised to retake power after a neck-and-neck election that nonetheless underlined the strength of the country’s far-right parties. Rising anti-immigrant sentiment has upended politics in Sweden, once one of the most welcoming countries to asylum seekers, as it has across Europe’s biggest economies: Marine Le Pen, ...

Beijing warned that AI advancements threatened China’s political, economic, and social stability even as it dismissed US calls to slow the technology’s development. China’s minister of state security wrote in a weekend essay that AI posed six principal risks from his perspective, including threatening the security of the country’s political ...

At a moment when the US is reconsidering the extent and purpose of its engagement abroad, I find myself returning to a lesson I confronted often in my time in government: After more than five decades working on Africa, one of the most important things the US can do is ...

The Scene “These are national resources that are now being monetized for the nation,” Pandu Sjahrir tells me when we meet. Sjahrir is the chief investment officer of the global sovereign-wealth club’s newest member, Indonesia’s Danantara. But it’s a sentiment popular these days with, among others, US Treasury Secretary Scott ...

The News Africa’s richest man Aliko Dangote tapped the opening gong this morning on the floor of the Lagos exchange to open Africa’s largest initial public offer. The $20 billion Dangote Refinery built on swamp land on the outskirts of Lagos becomes the fourth Dangote Industries subsidiary to go public ...

The Scoop Last September, Bloomberg News Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait got a call from US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. The secretary had been a regular on Bloomberg’s TV programming and in its reporting for years, first as the founder of a hedge fund, and increasingly as he rose in Donald Trump’s ...

The Scoop Citigroup has raised more than $40 billion to support Saudi clients so far this year, and increased its direct exposure to the kingdom since the Iran war began, maintaining its bet on the kingdom as a key growth market. The US bank has decided to boost internal exposure ...