MasterCard International and Standard Bank this month announced the launch of the pilot of OneSmart MasterCard PayPass at Standard Bank’s head office campus in Johannesburg, South Africa. The PayPass is a "contactless" payment feature that provides card holders with a faster and more convenient way to pay for their purchases.
Absa, South Africa’s largest retail bank, has launched a new product that will rapidly expand access to a range of banking services that have traditionally only been available to the affluent. FlexiSelect, a new concept in banking, promises to usher millions of South Africans into the financial mainstream.
The South African economy is still braced for robust growth in 2006 and the trend could well be sustained and even improved in the next year, says Absa economist Ridle Markus. He adds that the domestic economy will continue to be powered by growth in consumer spending.
With stringent limits now applying to the Road Accident Fund to limit how much one can claim in injuries from a negligent driver, it may be good idea to take out additional insurance cover in case one is seriously injured in a road accident. The public should be concerned about several changes within the Road Accident Fund Amendment Bill.
Funded by FinMark Trust and DFID, a new information leaflet and corresponding web page for people in the United Kingdom sending money home to family in South Africa was launched at an event at South Africa House at the beginning of May. A booklet for people working in South Africa who wish to send money to Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique or Swaziland was also unveiled.
The corporate world may be letting younger blood through the revolving doors but South Africa’s large corporates continue to choose relatively older, more experienced employees to fill their top jobs, especially those at exco (executive committee) level.
The past 10 years of his life had savaged the dilapidated novelist. His cheeks, once chubby and flushed, were flaking onion-skin drawn tight over a mangrove swamp of burst blood vessels; and his eyes — little round beads that had blinked quizzically from the back covers of 500-million paperbacks — were useless egg-whites swimming in two oily pans.
Massmart’s recent R1-billion black economic empowerment deal, following in the footsteps of Edcon’s BEE deal, shows clearly that companies will do deals despite being exempt from the government’s licensing and buying power. Retail, unlike mining and broadcasting, is not subject to licensing or contracting that gives the government the power to compel industries to negotiate a charter.
Killing British Prime Minister Tony Blair in a suicide bombing would be morally justified as revenge for the war in Iraq, firebrand lawmaker George Galloway has said. In a magazine interview that was widely reported on Friday, the MP for the anti-war party, Respect, was asked if it would be justifiable for a suicide bomber to blow up Blair, provided there were no other casualties.
South African Airways (SAA) has been voted the best airline based in Africa at the Official Airline of the Year Awards held in the United Kingdom. This is the sixth consecutive time that SAA has taken this award. Other awards presented to SAA this year include Best African Airline and Best International Airline for 2005.
Hamas agrees with 90 % of a document compiled by jailed faction leaders and which Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas wants the Islamists to adopt, members said on Friday. Adnan Asfur, a Hamas leader in the occupied West Bank, told cross-party crisis talks that his party approved "90%" of the document.
A well-known Australian climber given up for dead near the summit of Mount Everest may still be alive and rescuers are trying to reach him, a colleague said on Friday. Lincoln Hall (50) and one of Australia’s leading climbers, was reported by his Russian expedition leader earlier on Friday to have died on Thursday while descending from the summit of the world’s highest mountain.
A sex theme park designed to enhance its visitors’ lovemaking skills will open in the heart of London within months, the academy’s director announced on Wednesday. "Amora: The Academy of Sex and Relationships" is hoping to seduce up to 600 000 visitors through the doors in its first year.
Which came first, the chicken or the egg? According to a scientist, a philosopher and a chicken farmer, it was the egg, British newspapers reported on Friday. he key to the age-old question apparently lies in the fact that genetic material does not change throughout an animal’s life.
Former Enron chief executives Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay were found guilty on Thursday of fraud and conspiracy charges related to the spectacular 2001 meltdown of the energy giant. Skilling (52) was found guilty of 19 of 28 counts of fraud and conspiracy and faces a maximum penalty of 185 years in jail.
A hard-line Iranian group on Thursday announced the creation of a new "battalion" of "martyrdom seekers" — or suicide attackers — ready to carry out operations against targets. The group, called the Committee for the Glorification of Martyrs of the Global Islamic Movement, made the announcement at Tehran’s main cemetery where hundreds of supporters had gathered.
South Africa’s producer price index (PPI) rose by 5,5% year-on-year in April from a 5,4% increase in March, Statistics South Africa said on Thursday. Commented Mike Schussler, economist at T-Sec: "It’s a bit higher than I expected and I suspect it will have a negative impact on the bond market. But I don’t think it’s the end of the world."
Only weeks after warning that Zimbabwean inflation had topped 1 000%, the Imara financial-services group has now alerted investors to the fact that the figure is fast approaching 2 000%. John Legat, Harare-based CEO of Imara Asset Management, gave the 1 000% alert in mid-April, with official confirmation coming by the end of the month.
The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) has invited Sudan to join the powerful oil-industry cartel, the official Suna news agency reported on Thursday. Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo extended the invitation in a message delivered on Wednesday to Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir, the agency said.
A small earthquake caused panic in Stockholm on Wednesday night when inhabitants mistook a loud bang for an explosion, police said. Hundreds of Stockholm residents alerted police and abandoned their homes when they heard the noise, fearing a bomb had gone off.
South African retailer Mr Price on Thursday reported a 48% rise in diluted headline earnings per share to 154,7 cents for the year ended March from 104,7 cents a year ago. A total distribution of 81 cents per share — based on a cover of two times — was declared, up from 60 cents last year.
The South African Chamber of Business (Sacob) on Wednesday expressed concern at plans by the union representing security guards to spread their strike to other sectors of the economy. Sacob is particularly concerned about the ability of the South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) leadership to control its members.
The revelation that National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi appears to have been drawn into the orbit of the late Brett Kebble is deeply disturbing. Selebi’s relationship with Kebble’s security lieutenants — direct in the one case, indirect in the other — throws up critical questions.
The Turkish military released details on Wednesday of a collision between Turkish and Greek fighter jets in disputed airspace between the two Nato allies, saying that the Greek F-16 "harassed" the Turkish plane and crashed into it. A statement said two Turkish F-16s and an F-4, "on a routine training flight", were confronted by two Greek F-16s.
The increase in South Africa’s consumer price index excluding mortgage rate changes (CPIX) for metro and other areas, which is used by the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) for its inflation target, was up 3,7% year-on-year in April after a 3,8% increase in March, Statistics South Africa said on Wednesday.
An al-Qaeda-linked umbrella group in Iraq on Wednesday denied any link to a suspect, whose alleged confessions were aired on Jordanian television, in an internet statement posted on an Islamist website. "We don’t even know the individual shown on Jordanian television," the Mujahedin Consultative Council said.
Jurors deliberated for a fifth day on Wednesday in the fraud trial of former Enron chief executives Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay, after a separate trial of Lay before a judge on banking charges concluded. The eight women and four men, who have already debated for about 24 hours over four days, have given no indication of their progress.
South Africa’s national air carrier South African Airlines (SAA) has signed a consent order with the competition commission to pay R55-million in administrative penalties for fixing prices and fuel-levy charges on flight tickets. The airline was also penalised for abusing its dominant position in the domestic market.
Limited human-to-human transmission of bird flu may have occurred in an Indonesian family that lost seven members to the virus, but there was no evidence it had mutated into an easily transmissible form, the World Health Organisation said on Wednesday.
For a gay man with little knowledge of — or if truth be told, interest in — the vagina, the recent international conference on microbicides in Cape Town represented a personal turning point. To be honest, my knowledge of the "rectal compartment" — as the arse is euphemistically referred to in scientific circles — was hardly any better.
Two senior United Nations officials arrived in Sudan on Tuesday to discuss the planned deployment of peacekeepers from the world body in the war-torn western region of Darfur. The envoys "will discuss the UN resolution on Darfur with the Sudanese authorities," UN spokesperson Bahaa Elhoussy told Agence France-Presse.
Oil prices jumped above the $70 level in Asian trade on Tuesday as experts forecast a potentially devastating Atlantic hurricane season that could push prices to the $100 mark, dealers said. At 2.30pm local time, New York’s main contract, light sweet crude for July delivery, was up 29 cents at $70,25 a barrel.