Standard Bank makes $81m provision for Ghana bond losses
Standard Bank Group Ltd., Africa’s biggest lender by assets, made provisions to cover more than half of its holdings of Ghanaian bonds as the country works to reorganize its debt.
The Johannesburg-based lender set aside 1.5 billion rand ($81 million) to cover potential losses arising from the West African nation’s loan-restructuring program, it said it a statement on Thursday. The bank said its total holdings of both domestic and onshore dollar-denominated bonds is about 2.6 billion rand.
Standard Bank joins FirstRand Ltd. in covering potential losses in Ghana, which is working on restructuring most of its public debt, estimated at 576 billion cedis ($45 billion). The restructuring is a key condition for the nation to finalize access to a $3 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund.
Standard Bank’s shares erased earlier losses to climb as much as 0.8% by 9:30 a.m. in Johannesburg.
FirstRand said last week it impaired 496 million rand to cover potential losses. Nedbank Group Ltd., which has an indirect exposure to Ghana through its 20% holding in Ecobank Transnational Inc., estimated its exposure to the country’s sovereign debt at 175 million rand.
