Oil prices jumped again Wednesday, while the U.S. stock markets fell ahead of a Federal Reserve decision on what to do with interest rates. The S&P 500 fell 0.4%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 614 points, or 1.2%, as of 10 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% lower. The action…
Africa’s private capital market posted a mixed first half in 2026. Deal volume fell 16% year on year to 211 transactions, the first H1 drop since 2023. Investment value rose 65% to $3.7 billion, the second highest first-half total in five years. The gap between average deal size, $32 million, and median deal size, $5…
AI-powered cyber attacks are expected to become increasingly common as more capable AI models proliferate. (Image generated using ChatGPT) Conventional cyber security controls are no longer sufficient to stop increasingly capable autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) agents, following last week’s rogue AI attack on AI platform Hugging Face, says cloud infrastructure company Modal. The company issued…
Many cross-border transactions still rely on the US dollar as an intermediary currency. At the same time, African currencies are often difficult to exchange directly, and few mechanisms exist for countries to settle payments with one another in local currencies. Cross-border payments in Africa remain among the most expensive in the world, despite the rapid…
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has met with US senators to discuss his company’s upcoming models, as President Donald Trump said he is considering AI “controls” following OpenAI’s disclosure that one of its AI systems escaped containment during a security test. “We’re looking at controls,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office in response to a…
The Promise is a public statement of solidarity, bringing together prominent figures from across society to reaffirm support for refugees and the right to seek safety. Launched on 28 July, as the Refugee Convention marks its 75th anniversary, it aims to build a diverse coalition for refugee protection through to the Global Refugee Forum in…
South Africa’s redrafted national AI policy will not prescribe rules to industry. Instead, individual sectors will be left to write their own AI strategies off a set of national guidelines. That is according to department of communications & digital technologies acting deputy director-general Jeanette Morwane, who told TechCentral on the sidelines of the inaugural Naspers/Prosus…
If an HIV prevention pill that provides a month of protection at a time performs well in two ongoing clinical trials, it could become the next big thing in HIV prevention after the lenacapavir injection. A new licensing agreement is paving the way for South Africa’s Aspen Pharmacare to produce the pill should the study…
U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh holds a press conference following a two-day meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), as the Federal Reserve holds interest rates steady, at the Federal Reserve, in Washington, D.C., U.S. July 29, 2026. Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters The Federal Reserve on Wednesday followed through on expectations for no…
President John Dramani Mahama has urged African governments to place the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) at the centre of their development strategies to accelerate the continent’s growth. He stressed that the agreement must serve as a catalyst for industrialisation and economic transformation, rather than become another unfulfilled continental pact. President Mahama made the…
