Kenya goes for gold

It's touché to know that gold's glistening qualities are not only making fanboys out of retail investors looking to cash in big bucks, but sovereigns, too.

The latest country to fall under Old miss Gold’s spell is none other than Kenya. 

On April 25, Kenyan Wall Street reported that the country's central bank is looking to add gold to its foreign exchange reserve in hopes of giving its struggling reserves some buffer.

It's not hard to see why. 

Gold has been on a miraculous run, especially as other investment vehicles have dipped. For example, during US President Donald Trump's reciprocal tariff rampage, stock indexes receded by more than a thousand points, bonds fell, and treasury yields tumbled. However, gold stuck out like the positive antithesis of a sore thumb.

The investment knight in shining armour hauled in over 180% in the last month, summing up an impressive rally that started in January to cross $3,000 for the first time in decades. Gold (in ounces) now costs $3,218.

Last week, the US dollar weakened by 9% due to uncertainty around Trump's inspiring policy-making and the ongoing will-they-won't-they situation with China. This drove up a gold cash grab, with investors backing the asset against piling up the greenback.

Kenya’s reserves are mostly US dollars, and with the currency weakening, this is making countries rethink their exposure to volatility. Ghana and Egypt have also been busy stacking bullion recently, following the playbook of hedging against economic shockwaves.

But will building gold mountains be a gem in sovereign investment holdings—or if the momentum dies off, will it turn into a gilded liability? Selling off or trimming gold holdings from reserves isn’t as quick as flicking a switch. If the shiny fever breaks, unloading big stashes could prove slow and price-challenging in thin markets.

But, well, an unspoken rule in finance: when the opportunity arises, you make gains first, figure out blowbacks later. 

Meta’s Nigerian headache just got worse.

Last year, Nigeria’s Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) slammed the tech giant with a $220 million fine, accusing it of exploiting user data and enforcing unfair privacy policies through Facebook and WhatsApp. Meta threw a fit, appealed the fine, and hinted that it might just pull WhatsApp out of the country if regulators didn’t back off.

Spoiler: they didn’t.

On Friday, Nigeria’s Competition and Consumer Protection Tribunal ruled against Meta, upholding the fine and rejecting its arguments of “technical infeasibility.” In short: Pay up, and stay compliant.

In the ruling, the tribunal noted that Meta “cannot threaten regulators” just because compliance would be inconvenient.

Meta must now pay the $220 million fine, overhaul its data practices, and submit proof of compliance to regulators—or face further sanctions. WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram stay live in Nigeria, but Meta’s freewheeling days in Africa’s biggest market are officially over.

On April 25, MTN Group announced that it suffered a “cybersecurity attack” that affected some of its key operational markets, but didn’t disclose which of those markets. 

Cyber attacks at large corporations often go unreported or remain “contained,” but in South Africa, that gets you in trouble.

Know more: By South Africa's Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA 2013), companies are obliged to report incidents and cyberattacks that put consumer protection at risk or get fined. MTN was obliged to come forward with the information.

The telecom operator stressed that no core network, billing, or financial service systems were breached. Only some customer data was accessed. MTN. also said that it notified The Telco also noted that law enforcement agencies about the attack.

In a year where South Africa’s cybercrime numbers are already running high—with banking fraud rising by 45%—this new incident puts a fresh spotlight on how vulnerable big companies are, even when their tech seems tight.

If MTN’s core network, billing, or financial services systems had been hit, the consequences would have been far worse: outages in connectivity, customer billing errors, widespread financial fraud, and possibly millions of rands lost or stolen. Rebuilding trust and infrastructure after such a breach would also have been a much longer and costlier process.

While MTN has skillfully avoided naming which countries were affected, the cybersecurity rot still runs amok in Africa. Nigeria and Ghana are also struggling with rising cases of digital attacks targeting businesses and government services. Along with South Africa, the two countries rank high among the most threatened nations in the world.

It’s likely one of two things: we either need stronger shields—or a bigger broom. Because if Africa doesn’t find a way to beat the cyber attack beasts now, they’ll soon be running the whole castle—and cutting out the rot, rather than cauterising it, is no less a difficult task.