NAIROBI, Aug 22 (Reuters) – The following company announcements, scheduled economic indicators, debt and currency market moves and political events may affect African markets on Thursday.

EVENTS:

Kenya’s Finance Minister John Mbadi will host a meeting to discuss how to boost the mobilization of climate finance across Africa.

GLOBAL MARKETS

Oil fell for a fifth day in a row on demand jitters on Thursday, stocks were subdued in Asia, and the dollar hovered near one-year lows as Federal Reserve minutes signalled that U.S. interest rate cuts are set to begin in a few weeks’ time.

WORLD OIL PRICES

Oil prices fell for a fifth session on Thursday as global demand concerns exerted pressure on the market despite a decline in U.S. fuel inventories.

SOUTH AFRICA MARKETS

The South African rand softened on Wednesday as local inflation fell to a three-year low in July, solidifying analysts’ expectations of an interest rate cut by the South African Reserve Bank next month.

MALI SECURITY

The military juntas of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger have written to the U.N. Security Council to denounce what they said was Ukraine’s support for rebel groups in West Africa’s Sahel region, Mali’s foreign ministry said.

UGANDA OIL

Uganda is exploring for oil in two new regions where potential discoveries of crude could increase the East African country’s proven reserves of 6.5 billion barrels, its energy minister said on Wednesday.

RWANDA RATES

Rwanda’s central bank lowered its key interest rate by 50 basis points to 6.5% on Wednesday, its second cut in a row, saying inflation was projected to remain within its target band at around 5% on average.

KCB GROUP RESULTS

Kenyan lender KCB Group’s pretax profit for the first half of this year rose 70% to 38.11 billion shillings ($297 million), up from 22.46 billion shillings in the same period in 2023, it said on Wednesday.

((Compiled by Nairobi Newsroom))