BRICS Business

South African President Jacob Zuma, alongwith cabinet members, in talks with Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Bin Al Thani in Pretoria, South Africa on 11th April 2017 [Image: GCIS]South African President Jacob Zuma met Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Bin Al Thani in the capital, Pretoria, on Tuesday night.
Zuma and Al Thani will continue talks on Wednesday. The two sides are reviewing progress in bilateral political and economic relations between the two countries.

South Africa remains a lucrative buy, experts at a local conference said, despite the ratings downgrade. File photo: The Mall of Africa in Midrand, near Johannesburg, South Africa [Xinhua]
The rand continued to slide against the US dollar a week after S&P Global Ratings downgraded South Africa to “junk” status following President Jacob Zuma’s cabinet reshuffle in which five minsters were removed from cabinet and five ministers moved to new positions.
On March 27, the rand reached a 20-month best level of R12.31 to the dollar but fell to 13.9528 on Monday morning.

The State Council wants to ensure employment opportunities for the young and those who are graduating into the work force [Xinhua]
With a focus on continued economic reforms China’s State Council on Wednesday put forth a plan to ensure development and boost the jobs market.
The Council also supported the supply-side structural reforms which began in earnest in 2014 as China’s economic growth began to retreat from double digits to just around seven per cent.

69 train coaches will be produced by CRRC Dalian for subway operations in Nagpur, the largest city in central India [Xinhua]China’s top train maker CRRC Corporation has acquired a subway train order from Nagpur, India, the company said Sunday.
69 train coaches will be produced by CRRC Dalian for subway operations in Nagpur, the largest city in central India, according to an agreement signed by the company and a local subway company.
The trains are for two urban rails in the city with a total length of 38 km.

Trump, who has taken a harsh stance on China’s trade practices, last week tweeted that the meeting “will be a very difficult one”, citing massive trade deficits and American job losses [Xinhua]Ahead of a highly anticipated meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart Donald Trump, trade tensions between the two countries continue to grow.
China’s Ministry of Commerce has reacted to two new orders by US President Donald Trump calling for an investigation into trade abuses so as to reduce the US trade deficit.

It’s been a difficult few months for Zuma but his cabinet reshuffle will likely rock markets [Xinhua]
President Jacob Zuma announced a cabinet reshuffle shortly after midnight on March 31 in which five minsters were removed from cabinet and five ministers moved to new positions. The BRICS Post canvassed several economists and asset managers as to what this would mean and whether this would result in a ratings downgrade.

On annual basis, the current account deficit narrowed to 3.3 per cent of GDP in 2016 from 4.4 per cent in 2015
The South African current account deficit on the balance of payments narrowed to 5.1 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) on a seasonally adjusted annualized basis in the fourth quarter 2016 from a revised 3.8 per cent (previously 4.1 per cent) in the third quarter 2016, the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) said in its latest Quarterly Bulletin.

OPEC total production declines would have been stronger had it not been increased output from Iran and Nigeria [Xinhua]
There is growing momentum that an agreement between OPEC and non-OPEC members to curb oil production output be extended another six months in the hopes of re-balancing falling prices.
A committee bringing together the aforementioned oil producers had recommended the creation of a technical group which would study the prospects of the six-month extension.
Oil experts say delays to make such a move, however, will likely bring oil prices further down.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has said that the world’s economic powers cannot afford to close their doors to free trade [Xinhua]
In a testament of growing bilateral ties, Australia and China pledged on Thursday to safeguard globalization and free trade and do away with barriers which might be established as protectionist policies.
“We believe that to resolve trade imbalance we need to continue to expand trade, that is the solution. We cannot close our doors, that is not the solution,” Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said during his visit to the Australian capital Canberra.

Jack Ma founded Alibaba in 1999. In September 2014, it was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in the world’s biggest IPO [Xinhua]
Jack Ma, the chairman of Chinese ecommerce giant Alibaba, joined Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak to inaugurate the opening of a trading and logistics hub for the company in the capital Kuala Lumpur.
This would mark the first such hub outside the Chinese headquarters, which was established in Hangzhou in 1999.