Remgro/RMB Unbundling
South Africa is the land of monopolies. Historically, under the National Party, South Africa was cut off from the rest of the world and isolated from international competition. This led to the development of massive local monopolies such as that of SA Breweries and Anglo American (which at one stage controlled more than 50% of the blue chip companies on the JSE). Many of those monopolies consisted of enormous conglomerates of
The Moment of Truth
It is becoming very evident that South Africa is now facing a “moment of truthâ€. Following the mini-budget of end-October, it is clear that the fiscus has exhausted most of the normal and politically acceptable methods of dealing with its growing debt problem. Taxes are at an all-time high and borrowings are rising steadily to untenable levels. Various highly-respected experts have pointed to the fact that we are
Looking for Quality
The JSE Overall index (J203) shows an average of most of the shares listed on the stock exchange. It used to be dominated by commodity shares involved in extracting South Africa’s vast mineral wealth and exporting it overseas. Today, those massive mining companies have shrunk to a fraction of their former glory and instead the index is dominated by massive international companies like Naspers and Anheuser Busch. A large