Nigeria Content Online

Global stocks edged
higher on Tuesday on expectations the U.S. economy is on track for
recovery while the dollar slipped as commodity prices surged.

U.S. crude oil
futures rose above $91 a barrel and were near a 26-month high, boosted
by demand for heating oil after a storm hit in the U.S. East Coast and
by a weaker dollar. U.S. Treasury prices fell before a $35 billion
auction of five-year notes.

Trading volumes in
all markets were light due to the Christmas holiday and as the
northeastern United States dug itself out from the winter storm that
disrupted travel.

“Data in recent
weeks have been supportive of the stocks and commodity markets
globally. The U.S. will avoid a double-dip. The Asian region, including
Japan, looks a little bit better, with its industrial production
finally showing an increase,” said David Cohen, director of Asian
Economic Forecasting at Action Economics.

The MSCI All
Country World index .MIWD00000PUS rose 0.15 percent while the Thomson
Reuters global stock index .TRXFLDGLPU gained 0.02 percent.

But investors were
reluctant to take large new positions after weaker-than-expected U.S.
data on consumer confidence and home prices.

The S&P/Case
Shiller home prices indexes showed prices of U.S. single-family homes
fell almost double the expected pace in October, while confidence
unexpectedly deteriorated in December over increasing worries about
jobs.

While the data were
a negative surprise, “it’s not impacting the market so much due to the
light volume and lack of activity,” Peter Cardillo, chief market
economist at Avalon Partners in New York, said.

The Dow Jones
industrial average .DJI was up 2.91 points, or 0.03 percent, at
11,557.94. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index .SPX was down 0.68
point, or 0.05 percent, at 1,256.86. The Nasdaq Composite Index .IXIC
was down 7.87 points, or 0.30 percent, at 2,659.40.

The pan-European
FTSEurofirst 300 .FTEU3 index of top shares closed up 0.3 percent at
1,140.44 points. Volume was extremely low at just one-quarter of the
30-day average.

Many traders closed
their books for the year, while a holiday in Britain and bad weather in
the U.S. Northeast thinned trading floors. The UK market will reopen on
Wednesday.

Shares in Japan and
China eased on Tuesday on concerns further Chinese monetary tightening
will cool the engine of world economic growth. Those worries
overshadowed Japanese data that pointed to improving demand.

Japan’s Nikkei .N225 closed down 0.6 percent.

The dollar fell
against major currencies, with the U.S. Dollar Index .DXY down 0.11
percent as a rise in oil and gold prices kept the dollar pressured.

The euro EUR= was down 0.24 percent at $1.3126 after climbing as high as $1.3274 overnight.

“Dollar weakness is
basically on the back of commodities,” Dean Popplewell, chief
strategist of FX brokerage OANDA in Toronto, said. “Both oil and gold
are seeing robust demand. The market seems to have shrugged off the
interest-rate hike in China over the weekend.” The dollar also hit an
all-time low against the Swiss franc CHF=EBS at around 0.9435 francs on
year-end buying by Swiss corporates.

The yen rallied
against the dollar after data showed Japanese factory output rose for
the first time in six months in November. Against the Japanese yen, the
dollar JPY= was down 0.72 percent at 82.190.

Commodities rally, bonds eyed

Crude oil prices
CLc1 rose 0.43 percent to $91.38 a barrel, just shy of the $91.88
reached on Monday — the highest since October 2008.

Spot gold prices XAU= rose $20.24, or 1.46 percent, to $1,403.80 an ounce as the dollar fell.

“The end of the
year loss of confidence in the dollar value has brought gold players
back into the market on the long side,” said George Nickas, a broker at
FC Stone in New York.

U.S. government bonds were mixed in thin volume before the auction of new five-year notes.

The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note US10YT=RR was down 23/32,
with the yield at 3.4168 percent. The 2-year U.S. Treasury note
US2YT=RR was up 3/32, with the yield at 0.7196 percent. The 30-year
U.S. Treasury bond US30YT=RR was down 46/32, with the yield at 4.4865
percent.

Uncertainty
surrounds last Thursday’s expiration of the controversial extended
deadline for the payment of 30 per cent bid security for the sale of
the Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL) and its mobile
subsidiary, MTel.

Several calls to
the Director General, Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE), Bolanle
Onagoruwa, prior to close of official working hours last Thursday went
unanswered.

Spokesman to the
privatisation agency, Chukwuma Nwoko, said he did not have information
about the issue. “I don’t know anything about whether the payment has
been made or not. I am on leave. I am in my village as I am talking to
you. We have closed for the year,” he said.

Special Assistant
to the Director General, Azeez Aderemi, could neither confirm nor deny
that New Generation Consortium failed to meet the deadline for the
payment.

“Nobody is in the
office to confirm whether the payment has been done or not. The
Director General has travelled out of the country at the moment. I only
read in the media that the payment has not been made, and that
government is considering inviting the reserve bidder. I don’t know
where they got the story from,” Mr. Aderemi said.

Letters instead of payment

But, Usman Gumi,
the Chief Operating Officer, New Generation Consortium, confirmed
yesterday that his company has not paid the $750 million into BPE
account; even though the expiration of the December 23 extended
deadline in line with the provisions of the bid guidelines spelt out by
the National Council on Privatisation (NCP).

“What we (New
Generation Consortium) did was to send a letter from our financiers to
the BPE last Thursday, December 23 at 3.15 p.m., which is verifiable,
to prove that we have the fund in place to pay once the global finance
world has returned from the current holidays,” Mr Gumi said.

“We did not stop
there. We followed up with another letter with additional proof to
reassure everyone that we are capable and ready to fund the payment.
What we want to do is not just to pay for the initial bid security of
30 per cent, but the entire amount of $2.5billion at a go,” Mr Gumi
said.

Following
Presidency approval last October for the BPE to take steps to conclude
the privatisation process, New Generation was, on October 25, asked to
pay the initial bid security of $750 million within 10 calendar days
from the date of its receipt of a demand letter conveying its
acknowledgment as winner.

But, following a
request for 30 days extension to enable it mobilise funds for the
transaction, the NCP on November 5 granted the consortium 20 days
extension, to help the consortium “clarify all compliance and due
diligence issues and also to remit the funds into BPE’s account.”

The BPE claims the deadline extension did not take effect until
November 19 when the letter conveying the approval by the Vice
President and Chairman of the NCP, Namadi Sabo, was received by the
Consortium. The BPE had earlier announced the extension to take effect
from November 5 based on a verbal approval Mrs Onagoruwa claimed to
have received from the Vice President.

The Bauchi Meat Company is negotiating a N300 million contract with the Nigerian Army for the supply of minced meat.

The Commissioner
for Commerce and Industries, Yerima Giade, said this in an interview
with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Bauchi, on Tuesday.

Mr Giade said that
the contract when signed, will enable the company to supply the product
to soldiers in the UN peacekeeping operations abroad.

He said that the
product will be a substitute to the 600 cartons of dry meat (kilishi)
currently being supplied to soldiers in various peacekeeping missions
abroad.

Mr Giade explained that last year, the company had supplied dry meat but that authorities of the army preferred minced meat.

He said that
negotiations have also been intensified to get the various airlines and
the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to patronise the
product. He said that the company has expanded the supply of its
product to Abuja and Lagos to further boost its revenue base.

NAN recalls that
the company which was established in 1964, collapsed 25 years ago,
after it was inherited from the defunct Northern Nigeria Government
company and was resuscitated by the present administration.

The Lagos State
government is collaborating with the World Tourism Organisation (WTO)
to stage a capacity building workshop on the development of tourism in
Badagry in February 2011.

Sewanu Fadipe,
Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Tourism and Inter-Governmental
Relations, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Badagry on Tuesday
that the objective was to empower Badagry people through tourism.

He said the state government would also collaborate with the United Nations International Organisation (UNIDO) on the project.

“The UNIDO and WTO
sponsored workshop will hold in February as part of efforts to empower
the people on tourism. Badagry is a tourist destination and it has
hosted international events such as the Black Heritage festival and
Miss Badagry Tourism,” Mr Fadipe said. He said participants would be
drawn mainly from stakeholders in the tourism sector.

“The ongoing
construction of Lagos-Badagry 10-lane expressway is one of the projects
being designed by the Lagos State government to boost tourism in the
ancient town,” Mr Fadipe said.

The Kenyan
shilling held steady against the dollar in a slow market on Tuesday and
traders said they expected a firm underlying bid to continue, while
shares on the Nairobi Stock Exchange were mixed.

Commercial banks quoted the shilling at 80.60/70 to the dollar, against 80.55/65 at Friday’s close.

Although the
government declared Monday to be a working day, banking holidays
elsewhere meant only a handful of trades were made on the foreign
exchange market.

“There’s nothing.
Even on the interbank (market), I can see nothing happening. It’s only
a few customers here and there,” said Steve Lagat, a trader at CFC
Stanbic Bank.

“I think for the
next few days before the year ends, we will be trading in a narrow
range.” Traders said the shilling could strengthen slightly in the next
few days, but that it is likely to trade within a range of 80.30-80.80.

“We have seen some
dollar weakness globally that should have helped the shilling to
strengthen slightly. We are not seeing that happening here at the
moment, but I think going forward during the day and maybe tomorrow, we
could see some shilling strength,” said Andlip Mohamed, senior trader
at I&M Bank.

“I think … international market players are just squaring their positions before the end of the year.”

South Africa’s rand
advanced to a new three year high against a broadly weaker dollar on
Tuesday and was also boosted by higher metal prices.

The rand was
trading at 6.6750 against the dollar at 10:10 GMT, one percent firmer
than Monday’s New York close of 6.7415. It touched 6.6725, its
strongest since Dec 2007.

Egypt’s finance
ministry will offer three-year, five-year and 10-year bonds worth 4
billion Egyptian pounds in an auction on January 3, the central bank
said on Tuesday.

The three-year bonds worth 1.5 billion pounds, which will mature on October 5, 2013, carry a coupon of 11.6 percent.

The same amount of five-year bonds will be issued, maturing on September 14, 2015, and carrying a coupon of 12.35 percent.

The 1 billion pound issue of 10-year bonds will mature on August 3, 2020, and will carry a coupon of 13.0 percent.

The bonds are sold by the central bank, acting on behalf of the finance ministry. Settlement will take place at January 4.