The kwacha, the Lusaka Securities Exchange, interest rates, banking and commodity prices.
22 posts
The US Federal Reserve held its policy rate at 3.5–3.75% for a third straight meeting in April 2026 on an 8-4 vote, and markets now see a real chance the next move is a hike rather than a cut as an energy shock revives inflation. Gold has surged past $4,700, with banks forecasting $5,000 or more. For frontier borrowers such as Zambia, higher-for-longer US rates raise the cost of external debt — but a record copper price and a strong kwacha are cushioning the squeeze.
Anthropic's enterprise business is running past $30 billion a year, up from about $9 billion at the end of 2025, on the back of Claude Opus 4.7, deals such as KPMG rolling Claude out to 276,000 staff, and a $200 million Gates Foundation partnership. Its new Claude for Small Business pushes the model into tools Zambian firms already use — QuickBooks, PayPal, HubSpot, Canva and Microsoft 365. This analysis weighs what the enterprise-AI surge means for Zambian SMEs, and the connectivity and cost gaps that still stand in the way.
MTN Zambia and SpaceX's Starlink have completed Zambia's first satellite data session and first mobile-money transaction over a satellite link, routed through MTN's MoMo platform to a standard smartphone with no special hardware. MTN Zambia became the first African operator to finish Starlink Direct-to-Cell testing and is targeting commercial service within weeks, pending approval from the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority. The technology promises to extend payments and connectivity to rural areas terrestrial networks have never reached.
The Bank of Zambia's Currency Directives, 2025 require that all domestic transactions in Zambia are settled in kwacha rather than US dollars, even where a contract is priced in a foreign currency. Issued under the Bank of Zambia Act, 2022 and effective from 26 December 2025, the rule converts foreign-currency contracts at the market rate, exempts banking, securities, insurance and specified mining flows, and carries penalties of up to 2,500 penalty units or two years' imprisonment. This explainer sets out how the kwacha-only rule works and who it affects.
Zambian consumer inflation fell to 7.5% year-on-year in February 2026, its lowest since June 2018 and the first reading inside the Bank of Zambia's 6-8% target band since April 2019. A kwacha that has strengthened around 30% against the dollar and a maize harvest that more than doubled to 3.7 million tonnes pulled food and import prices down. Lower inflation eases the cost of living and gives the central bank room on its 14% policy rate, though an oil-price shock remains the main risk to the outlook.
Zambia's copper output is forecast to pass one million tonnes in 2026, with Fitch Solutions projecting a 10% rise as expansion projects at Barrick's Lumwana, Konkola Copper Mines, Mopani and Lubambe add around 400,000 tonnes a year at full ramp-up. The milestone underpins GDP growth near 6.4%, lifts mineral royalties and supports the kwacha, and marks a step toward the government's stated target of three million tonnes by 2031. Power supply remains the central risk to the forecast.
Copper hit a record above $13,000 a tonne on the London Metal Exchange in 2026, with a record $6.69 a pound on the US Comex on 13 May, as buyers rushed to import metal ahead of further US Section 232 tariffs. For Zambia, where copper is the dominant export, the rally lifts mineral royalties, strengthens the kwacha and eases debt servicing — though most Zambian exports are exempt from the duty driving the price. A US Commerce Department review on refined-copper tariffs is due by 30 June 2026.
Banks everywhere are pushing AI into credit decisions, fraud detection and customer service. The technology is real and the efficiency gains are real. But a Daily Maverick reflection makes the sharper point: in an AI age, trust is the scarce asset, and a bank that automates faster than it earns trust is building on sand. For Zambia, where banking confidence is still being built, the sequence matters more than the speed.
The mobile-money agent — the person at the kiosk who turns cash into digital value and back — is the most important node in Zambia's financial system. A new agent training manual from the Payments Association of Zambia marks a shift: the agent network is being treated as a profession with standards, not an informal patchwork. The move matters because agents are where financial inclusion, fraud risk and consumer trust all meet.
Two forces dominate global markets: a bond reckoning, as investors demand higher yields to hold government debt, and an AI investment mania driving a capital-spending boom. They pull in opposite directions. The resolution sets the global cost of capital — and for a frontier borrower like Zambia, the global cost of capital is the gravity that sets domestic borrowing rates. Here is the tension, decoded, and why it reaches Lusaka.
The Securities and Exchange Commission of Zambia now publishes daily GRZ bond secondary-market trade summary reports. They are dry documents. They are also one of the clearest windows into the cost of money in Zambia: where government bond yields sit, how much trading is happening, and what investors think of the fiscal path. Here is how to read the secondary market, and why its liquidity matters far beyond the trading desk.
The United Nations has cut its 2026 global growth forecast, citing the Middle East crisis and elevated oil prices as the main drags. For Zambia, a downgraded world outlook is not an abstraction. It transmits directly through three channels: copper demand and price, the kwacha exchange rate, and the fuel-import bill that feeds domestic inflation. The size of each channel decides how much a weaker world costs Lusaka.
OpenAI introduced GPT-5.5 on 22 April 2026, framing the model as a step toward real work on a computer rather than chatbot back-and-forth. A safety system card shipped alongside.
From 24 June 2026, Zambian commercial banks stop processing cheques. The Bank of Zambia phase-out is final, the rationale is sound — cheques are the slowest, most fraud-prone payment rail in the system — and the practical question for businesses is what to use instead. The answer is a three-rail mix: real-time gross settlement (RTGS) for large payments, the Zambia Electronic Funds Transfer (ZEFT) system for routine batched flows, and mobile money for everything small.
The Africa Soft Power Summit runs in Nairobi from 20 to 23 May 2026, drawing investors, creators, policymakers and technologists around a single question: when finance, creativity and human capital compound together, what becomes investable? For Zambia — whose creative economy sits behind only mining and agriculture in informal earnings but barely registers in formal capital allocation — the answer matters.
Ethiopia spent two decades as Africa's most state-owned major economy. The government is now unwinding the telecoms monopoly, opening the banking sector to foreign players and standing up a proper capital market for the first time. African Business calls it a 'hidden tech awakening'. For Zambia and the Lusaka Securities Exchange, the lesson is in the sequencing — what Ethiopia is doing now is what Zambian markets pulled off a generation earlier, and the reverse-engineering opportunities are real.
LUSAKA — The Bank of Zambia is closing the cheque system. Circular 08/2024 sets 24 June 2026 as the last day customers can deposit a cheque at any commercial bank.
LUSAKA — Brent crude is back above $110 a barrel after Donald Trump's latest warning to Iran and that is the variable Zambian fuel prices and the kwacha will struggle to absorb.
LUSAKA — The latest round of US–South Africa critical-minerals talks is a fresh entry on a board where Zambia is already a named player through the trilateral MoU and the Lobito Corridor.
Bank of Zambia Governor Denny Kalyalya says the central bank does not forecast the exchange rate and that whether the kwacha keeps appreciating depends on underlying export earnings, fiscal discipline and investor sentiment.
Kansanshi Mining PLC says it spent about US$21 million on local procurement in the first quarter of 2026, drawing supply from 553 local companies and renewing contracts with named suppliers including Cable Network Solutions and Blue Lithium Communications.
Economist Trevor Hambayi argues Zambia must own at least 60% of its mines and bypass European intermediaries to benefit from China's new zero-tariff policy. Fellow economist Bright Chizonde calls for an outright suspension of raw-material exports.
Markets is the daily read on prices and the money system: the kwacha against major currencies, the Lusaka Securities Exchange, government bonds and yields, the Bank of Zambia's policy rate, and the commodity prices — copper above all — that drive Zambian export earnings. The section also follows the banking and fintech sector and the spread of mobile money. The aim is signal over noise: enough context to tell a one-day move from a trend, and enough plain language that the reporting is useful whether or not you trade.
Business & Economy
Zambian business, the macro economy, trade and investment — what is moving and why it matters.
World
The global economy and markets — the international context behind the domestic story.
Technology/AI
Zambian and African technology and artificial intelligence — startups, the digital economy, frontier models, and the policy around them.