Today's edition
Seven Years' Notice
Good morning. Sound the alarm: SARS is completely rethinking how VAT works in South Africa. On top of that, we’ve also got a major change to electricity pricing, an oil rush next door, and a coal mine stuck in a decade-long fight. Let’s get into it.
MARKETS
BASIN INSTINCT
Equinor bought into Namibia's oil hunt four days after South Africa's top court closed the Wild Coast
Before we jump into the VAT story, peak over next door. Equinor signed a deal in Windhoek on Tuesday for 17.4% of an offshore block in Namibia's Orange Basin, buying it from the Chevron subsidiary that operates the licence. It is the Norwegian company's first position in Namibia, and the block already has a well ready to drill this year.
Four days earlier South Africa's Constitutional Court set aside the Wild Coast exploration right that Shell had bought half of, and shut the renewal route the Supreme Court of Appeal had left open. The dissenting judgment put the companies' Wild Coast spend at about R1.1bn. Despite that, the judge held that commercial investment cannot outweigh serious constitutional violations - pointing to the fact that coastal communities were never consulted on the exploration right.
Who else is already in the Orange Basin:
- Chevron's Harmattan Energy operates licence 90 and held 52.5% before the sale, alongside QatarEnergy on 27.5%, with Trago Energy and Namibia's state oil company on 10% each.
- TotalEnergies, QatarEnergy, Shell, BP and Eni are all exploring the basin. Equinor makes six.
- Shell wrote off $400m on Namibian wells, then went back to drilling in April, and its June well returned the best results that licence has produced.
VAT'S THE HOLD-UP
SARS has published the plan to replace the VAT return, and it does not finish until about 2033
SARS put its VAT Modernisation Consultation Paper out for comment on Monday. It proposes that:
- Your accounting system issue a structured invoice.
- An accredited operator check and clear it.
- It's passed on to your customer's operator.
- It's sent through to SARS (in near real-time).
- SARS pre-fills the return and work out what you owe.
As for the runway, the timetable inside that same paper extends years past the 2028 readiness date vendors and advisers have sold all year. TechCentral, reading the road map, puts testing in 2028/29, a voluntary pilot in 2029/30 and about 36 months of phasing in from 2030, which would land full roll-out around 2033.
BAGEL BITE
Which bone is the only one not joined to another bone?
A. Hyoid
B. Sternum
C. Patella
DOING THE ROUNDS
Your electricity bill is about to start explaining itself. Cabinet has approved the first rewrite of the electricity pricing policy since 2008, and it goes into the Government Gazette on Friday. Eskom and municipalities will have to itemise bills and may not charge paying customers for their own inefficiency. Free basic electricity for poor households climbs from 50 units a month to between 200 and 300. Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa's headline number for the past two decades says all you need to hear: tariffs up 907% since 2007, against inflation of 150%. Full story →
Uthaka Energy has been trying to open the same Mpumalanga coal mine for a decade, and it has told the Constitutional Court who it blames. The Indian-owned company, formerly Atha-Africa, says a green lobby has run review after review against its Yzermyn project inside the Mabola protected area, and that the R1bn it has put in has produced no mining. The eight organisations challenging the mine answer that litigation is a commonplace, legitimate way of holding parties to the rule of law. Full story →
Standard Bank wants a piece of a Nigerian payments app before Wall Street gets to price it. Bloomberg reports Africa's biggest lender by assets is in talks for a pre-listing stake in OPay, known for its army of green card machines and now working with Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and JPMorgan on a New York float. OPay turned profitable last year, more than doubled transaction values to $358bn and serves as many as 50 million users. Nothing is signed, and both companies declined to comment. Full story →
TikTok is building a way for users to send each other money inside direct messages. Bloomberg found the references in code inside the US iPhone app. The feature would run on TikTok Pay, which already handles TikTok Shop purchases in Southeast Asia, and the code suggests a sender could attach a note while the recipient taps to accept, much like Venmo. TikTok says the feature is not being tested, though it did ask Brazil's central bank this year for permission to offer loans and payments. Full story →
WEATHER
BAGEL GAMES
Have you got what it takes to win today’s Wordle? Play here →
THE ANSWER
As for the Bagel Bite, the answer is: A. Hyoid
The hyoid sits at the front of the neck and is held in place by muscles, ligaments and cartilage rather than forming a joint with another bone. It supports the tongue and anchors several muscles involved in swallowing and speaking. It also helps keep the airway stable during breathing, making this small bone important for several everyday functions.
That's Thursday wrapped. Enjoyed it? Forward it on, a friend can subscribe in a click. Written by the Business Bagel crew.
