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Zambian men are aging like fine counterfeit wine.A forty-six year old Zambian man in 2025 is nothing like a year forty-six old man in 1990. We’re expected to be successful earlier in life, while managing the early onset of middle age. Wasn’t it sixty year olds who had grey hair? I started going grey in […]

These new cars, man. They talk to you, park themselves, wake you up when you’re sleepy at the wheel. But the one thing that stands out is the lane assist feature – bringing you back into your lane when the vehicle is moving off its course.Men, with all the love we have for our cars, […]

By Tshepo Magagane As people pile into mining without any knowledge or experience – understand these simple things – this should simply have never been issued. I want to see the NPV at 1.3k downside. I want to see base case at 1.8k. Spot is upside. Think about it simplistically: * Debt provider – for […]

Guest Writer: Savior Mwambwa Despite rapid GDP growth averaging 7.7% annually in the 2000s during the copper boom, poverty remained widespread, with 60% of Zambians still below the poverty line in 2022, and between 1996 and 2015, the number of people living in poverty actually increased by 2.5 million. This is not an anomaly but […]

Written By Tshepo Magagane If we are waiting for any Western entity to come and unlock this for us…..we are still hallucinating! We need to be truly smart about unlocking this FOR OUR OWN BENEFIT! We are currently observes in this whole thing and it is getting worse. Let us use whatever capital is available […]

Written By Tshepo Magagane If Africa was to actually lead the unlock of mining – it would create private capital ecosystems – I will continue to put the Khoemacau eg if a local vehicle – Batswana or other SADC – had just put up USD8m, they would have turned that into USD500m – even at […]

By Tshepo Magagane I mean, the likes of Thor, I would happily pay a premium and buy it at 2-3x PER! But others, what do you input as LT gold price? It has value destruction written all over it there! In a gold story, you are coming in at 1. NAV 2. Prices have moved […]

By Tshepo Magagane I have been following Chemaf for the past 15yrs! Close to USD700m has been sunk into this! It is at best a Tier 4 project. BUT see the fight the Chinese are putting to get hold of it, you have seen Special Forces from the US also entering this fight. Or the […]

Guest Writer: Davies Sikopo Snr The Boy Child Advocacy Zambia has officially handed over two sets of football jerseys to the Blue Foxes Football Club, a Kwame Nkurumah University League Team of Kabwe, Central Province. The donation, made possible through the generous sponsorship of Pangaea Securities as part of its Partnership initiative with the Boy […]

Men will take their lovely family for a meal at a restaurant and won’t fuss about the chicken piece on their plate. A day or two later, at home, see how he becomes ungovernable after getting served with a drumstick. Man is one version in public and another in the comfort of his home. If Charity […]

Chabala Sunkutu 2025 has been a remarkable year for Zambia’s economy. After the challenges of recent years, we’ve seen a strong rebound that is restoring confidence across industries. Real GDP grew by 4.5% in Q1 and 5.2% in Q2, and both the IMF and the government project full-year growth between 5.8% and 6.0%, which, if […]

As the world requires more mining in the age of electrification Capital has been simply decimated for the sector How does the world untangle this Gordian-Knot? Historic Context – Merchant Banking was the cornerstone of Mine definition and development Eg Strategic Equities book at Merchant Bank would be at USD10bn (unlocking from geophysics stage) This was […]

By Tshepo Magagane Does the concept of a reserve currency work anymore? And the argument various currencies has been: GBP – in a drift EUR – gamble CHF – restricted in size RMB – restricted regulation wise But now with the USD (canary in the coal mine is Microsoft yielding less than Treasuries) * Sanctions […]

By Tshepo Magagane I was looking for structured offtake solutions for this Credit Fund at the time. One company is chaired by my ex-boss! They were going through PF – price was about USD1,200/oz. He was happy to hear from me but immediately went “nope, thank you very much Tshepo, I have approached this PF […]

Comments By Tshepo Magagane The level of naivety is truly scary and surprising at the same time! Few egs 1. In the mid-00s during the lead up to Chinese Steel production – we were very close to ArcelorMittal – through its deals from EEurope, WEurope, SAmerica, Africa, NAmerica… …all done, even the takeover of Arcelor […]

By Tshepo Magagane I truly understand why people capitulate  1. Perpetual motion of free money – governments / economies cant stand any normalisation of the cost of money 2. Price discovery is truly dead – ETFs buy at any price Brilliant read – with a heavy quants background, I always detested how much emphasis people […]

The only time a man gets a free pass is when he takes his child to the under five clinic. There, men are celebrated for taking their children for regular check-ups and immunization. You’re placed ahead of the queue to reward you for being a present dad. Outside of that, men don’t get anything for […]

Sundays are when existential dread sneaks up on a man. He wonders when he’ll have a showroom vehicle in his yard, questions if his children resemble him, ponders whether waking up with a hangover and stranger in his bed is how his life will be.  It all boils down to the pandemic of male loneliness. […]

Now that you’re a grown man, there are things that seem to be circling back into your orbit. No, it’s not the ghastly return of cargo pants. It’s the way you’re becoming just like your father, uncle or grandfather. We men are all the same, aren’t we?  A popular perception is that our fathers, uncles […]

Now that you’re a grown man, there are things that seem to be circling back into your Ma fella, let’s talk about something that affects every Zambian man’s well-being. The ability to rise to the occasion when life demands it. No, not that occasion when the flag flies at half mast. Guest Commentor: Michelo Mukata […]

By Tshepo Magagane My read – yes, balance sheet is stronger BUT I dont think you can price a Tier 1 asset right now. Will be like trying to sell a stake in an Iron Ore asset in 2003. Price was 30/t – in 05 went up to 65/t – think about that – it […]

By Tshepo Magagane Investing / Commodities lesson! Was having this conversation with a distressed debt investor I worked with around 09 about this. He was linking it to investing – especially a question that he liked in interviews “X is trading at 2 but you analysis says 5” …you buy in and sell at 4 […]

By Tshepo Magagane At this early stage is where the greatest value creation lies! You will hear all this, “we only do feasibility stage projects” – know that the capital does not understand the sector. No one ever made real money in mining by coming in at BFS! You need to do the risk unlock […]

Tshepo Magagane Hudbay sells 30% of the project for an implied valuation of USD2bn – Tier 2 project and focuses on the Cu grades in the attached. Why whoever solves this conundrum of these 0.6-1% projects in Zambia will unlock generational wealth creation multiples of what we saw with Iron Ore in Australia. This is […]

By Tshepo Magagane They are no longer there but remember that they unlocked every project you see out there producing across different commodities. Without them the world of Mine Finance is excessively challenging. NB: remember these stats – our team had a book of USD10bn (I am excluding PF, DL, SL, TF here) to support […]

By Savior Mwambwa I suspect that like me, most African policy makers, thinkers and finance experts must be  watching the US-China trade tensions unfold with a mix of concern and urgency. It’s reshaping global supply chains in ways that could hit African nations hard if we don’t get ahead of it. A fresh piece What’s It […]

Most of us know a man or two who is with a partner that society would say is ‘too good for him’. Fascinating concept, this. To look at two people and decode that one of them is pulling the other down and not that one is lifting the other. At the bar, it’s called punching […]

I will give you this eg of Kumba Iron ore and ArcelorMittal South Africa (Arcelor has these agreements globally). With the Kumba one, the iron ore assets were effectively written-off to zero and spun out… …what the steel operations held on to was the supply of this production to support steel (& expansion) at a […]

By Tshepo Magagane When QE started post GFC, the below was our overriding thesis at the HF – note the emphasis on real assets such as Commodities; it is even more urgent now, the USD is being debased (the US is like an EM country that has been taken over by a military dictator – […]

By Tshepo Magagane Sometimes it is so difficult to really convey the opportunity at hand! The average project can generate an EBITDA margin of cUSD5,000/t (DRC will be higher given the higher grades). Now this about when Copper prices start to move – it is just dropping to the bottom line! I have the attached […]