Spreadsheet Ranger

I saw this in Pick n Pay and thought it's quite fitting for a finance forum considering the original monopoly board game is what got me into finance in the first place. Competitors charge fair market value while monopolists take over whole neighborhoods and jack up rents. In real life, monopolists have an unfair advantage. But in Anti-Monopoly, competitors have a fair shot at coming out on top!

Johannesburg - National Treasury is pressuring the Public Investment Corporation (PIC) to provide as much as R100bn to fund struggling state-owned enterprises, according to two people with knowledge of the situation. The PIC, which manages state-employee pension funds and has about R1.86trn in assets, has been asked by the Treasury to buy its entire R12bn stake in Telkom to pay for a bailout of South African Airways (SAA), said the people, who asked not to be identified as the talks are private. PIC chief executive officer Daniel Matjila has rejected the request, saying a purchase of the 39 percent shareholding would leave the company overexposed to the landline provider, they said. After a bailout for SAA, which is technically insolvent, the government needs cash for state power utility Eskom, oil company PetroSA and defense firm Denel, according to the people. The companies have been beset by allegations of mismanagement and corruption. The management of state firms was cited by rating agencies when they cut South Africa to junk in April. Matjila is willing to buy about R2bn worth of Telkom shares, which would boost the PIC’s stake to about 18 percent, the people said. Clients mandate The PIC will make investment decisions in terms of the clients’ mandate, it said in an emailed response to questions. PIC chairperson Sfiso Buthelezi, who is also deputy finance minister, isn’t currently taking questions on the PIC, the National Treasury said in emailed comments. He gave his full support to the board and CEO last week, it said. The PIC has helped the government raise money before. In 2015 it bought the state’s R25bn stake in Vodacom to raise funds for Eskom, which was struggling at the time with countrywide blackouts. The money manager has holdings equivalent to about 13 percent of the market value of companies that trade on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. The battle over the PIC’s leadership and funds represents the latest struggle over the management and independence of a state-owned enterprise, with the pensions of public-sector workers including nurses and teachers at stake. On Thursday, the Federation of Unions of South Africa, SA's second-biggest labour union grouping, said it would consider replacing the PIC with privately owned money managers if its members’ savings are used to bailout state entities. The impasse between the finance ministry and Matjila was behind last week’s accusation that the CEO used PIC funds to finance a personal project, the people said. Matjila, 55, denied the allegations, and his response was accepted by the board after a lengthy meeting. Buthelezi wanted to suspend Matjila and replace him with a more co-operative candidate and the board continues to investigate the CEO and deals he has overseen, the people said. After the meeting, the PIC’s board said it had confidence in the ability and integrity of Matjila and rejected allegations it wanted him removed. “We are not aware of any new CEO being sought,” the PIC said. Clashes The running of businesses including SAA led to clashes between President Jacob Zuma and former finance ministers Nhlanhla Nene and Pravin Gordhan. At Eskom, acting CEO Matshela Koko and chief financial officer Anoj Singh have both been suspended after being linked to questionable contracts. An internal report found that Trillian Capital Partners, linked to the Gupta family, and US consultant McKinsey & Co made R1.6bn in fees, according to amaBhungane and Scorpio. In August, Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba told executives of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) that he can’t guarantee the government won’t attempt to make use of funds held by the PIC to recapitalise state-owned enterprises and fund other projects, Business Day reported, without saying how it obtained the information. That’s caused concern among labor unions. “The union reserves its rights while considering options to stop any public servants’ pension fund money being wasted into SAA,” the Public Servants Association said in a statement on Friday.

Ahh man! That guy is my hero, I wonder what the Afrihost support over at Airforce one is saying. Probably instructed to deny left right and center. Those guys, professional liars.

I lol'ed so hard reading this OP hahaha. It's most likely in anticipation for the fork in November.

In 2016 the three young founders of Fingertips, a mobile app that looks to help unbanked students make payments and send money to other students at any higher institution of learning using their student numbers as a proxy account number, ran into a problem as finalists in the Fintech Challenge with Nedbank. They needed to partner with a bank in terms of the technical and regulatory barriers for building a financial product like Fingertips. A conversation with Nedbank was key to unlocking what the next step could be for Fingertips, says Chris Wood, emerging payments and strategy executive at Nedbank. According to the bank, Fica would not be an issue for Fingertips and advised the start-up on reinforcing security checks, talking to universities on the use of their data and e-merchants such as Zando on the viability of plugging in Fingertips’ payment system into their application programming interface. Although Nedbank had been having such conversations with entrepreneurs for years, the format of the conversation was more intimate and insightful, with the banking experts telling them where they are in the business cycle and giving them tips and things to consider to move closer to their goals. This inspired Nedbank and Stellenbosch University’s business incubation programme, LaunchLab, to invite budding entrepreneurs to events where they could deliver business pitches and receive advice on the way forward from banking experts of different backgrounds ranging from business, corporate technology to financial services. One such event was held at LaunchLab’s offices in Stellenbosch on 18 September. According to Wood, the objective of these events is to have value-added conversations leading to growth down the line. The business model of LaunchLab is to “work with clients such as Nedbank and run challenges for them, then sourcing entrepreneurs from all over the country and putting the best in front of a panel of judges”, said Phillip Marais, CEO of the LaunchLab. “Our clients will choose the ones that they like and we’ll incubate those on their behalf and we’ve been doing that with Nedbank for a few years.” Marais said such events were exciting for them as they are all about creating coalitions and interactions between LaunchLab residents and different outside parties such as potential funders and business partners. Since its inception, the programme has created more than 60 jobs, 16 black-owned companies and 15 women-owned companies. Of the 100 companies that went through the programme, 50 have grown and left the LaunchLab, 20 have orbited – meaning that they have reached a point where their business model had been proven while others have exited before this stage but are still running. The entrepreneurs who got to make their presentations during the most recent event were mainly involved in the fintech space with some exciting solutions to offer. One of these was Sxuirrel, a peer-to-peer marketplace that brings together hosts and guests from within a community, to create local, unique and flexible storage solutions. The app has been operational for three months with more than 250 downloads and 15 listings predominantly in the Stellenbosch area, with the goal of expanding to other markets. According to Michael-John Dippenaar, CEO and co-founder of Sxuirrel, “it is an affordable storage solution that allows you to find or list space easily, essentially turning your unused space into cash”. They connect people with space, parking and storage to those who need it. The app holds a 49% conversion rate (the number of people that see, click and download their app) and high retention ratio, which are indicative of the need for this type of service. Other start-ups that delivered presentations included Gift Drop, a vouchering, loyalty and gifting service using an integrated technology platform and Jobbo, which is trying to come up with a way to give work to independent painters and builders by building a system to locate, hire, pay and rate them.

San Francisco - Google agreed to buy part of HTC’s engineering and design teams for $1.1bn, taking on a cadre of veterans that worked on the Pixel phone and could bolster its nascent hardware business. Alphabet’s Google is taking on some 2 000 employees with experience working on its signature Pixel devices, intended to showcase the best features of the Android software that now power the vast majority of the world’s smartphones. The deal also comes with a non-exclusive licensing agreement for HTC intellectual property. Google now gains tighter control over the design and production of the Pixel and other devices, potentially helping sales. Those gadgets are becoming the pillars of a strategic push to distribute critical software products like its voice-enabled assistant and better compete with Apple. The search giant is preparing to unveil a second generation of devices in October, building on a portfolio that runs the gamut from Google Home speakers to Daydream virtual reality headsets. “The end game here is more flexibility on hardware innovation, which can spur incremental revenue through services enabled by those innovations,” said Jitendra Waral, a senior analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence. “Google essentially gets more control over its hardware design, it can help them accelerate innovation with its own products and use that as the benchmark for the Android ecosystem to follow.” Alphabet investors may be concerned about history repeating itself. In 2012, Google paid $12.5bn for Motorola Mobility, then a leading Android handset manufacturer. In less than three years, Google sold it to Lenovo for less than $3bn, while keeping Motorola’s valuable patent portfolio. Owning Motorola had eroded the search giant’s profit margins and upset other phone makers that relied on Android, Google software that it supplies to handset manufacturers to promote its services. The HTC transaction however costs a lot less and comes at a very different time - when Google and its biggest rivals are more focused than ever on consumer devices built around new artificial-intelligence and augmented-reality services. AR demands powerful, expensive cameras and sensors working in sync with software to process and superimpose 3-D images on real world scenes. Having different Android partners making their own phones with disparate components makes this task more difficult for Google - especially when Apple can pick one set of AR hardware to marry to its software. “For Google, HTC is a completely different deal than Motorola,” said Jason Low, a Canalys analyst based in Shanghai. “It needs better control over manufacturing if it expects the Pixel series to compete with iPhones someday.” Google has also launched its own phones since Motorola, so Android phone makers have gotten used to their partner as a rival. And some of the biggest emergent manufacturers, such as China’s Huawei and Xiaomi, are now less reliant on Google for services. The production resources of HTC - which assembled the first Pixel device and was key to the Nexus line - may support its existing phone operation. Greater control of hardware production would also give Google more influence over the distribution of new services such as its voice-based digital assistant. Google didn’t say exactly how it would retain employees after the acquisition, only that it is working on the details. The company - like many of Silicon Valley’s frontrunners - has a reputation for comfy perks and compensation. A more Apple-like approach would also let Google steer the Android operating system in its preferred direction. The tech giant has struggled to get handset makers and carriers to ship Android devices with the latest secure software. The Pixel was designed, in part, to prompt phone makers push out these updates faster. Yet some Android partners are moving ahead with competing software efforts - Huawei linked up with Amazon’s assistant, and Samsung has its own. “It’s still early days for Google’s hardware business. We’re focused on building our core capabilities,” Rick Osterloh, senior vice president of hardware, said in a blog post. “A team of HTC talent will join Google as part of the hardware organization. These future fellow Googlers are amazing folks we’ve already been working with closely on the Pixel smartphone line, and we’re excited to see what we can do together as one team.” Google’s Pixel is far from a top-selling phone. External estimates pegged sales at 552 000 units during its first quarter. Yet selling Pixels has auxiliary benefits for Google, chief among them the boost to its primary sales. With each Pixel phone it moves, Google doles out less in traffic acquisition costs: it pays money to partners like Apple and carriers to install Google’s search service. That cost has risen steadily, pulling down its sales totals last quarter in particular. A bigger hardware unit would offset such expenses, Eric Sheridan, an analyst at UBS, wrote in a recent research note. But it also comes with more spending, in maintenance and marketing. An HTC acquisition and larger Google hardware unit could hurt the company’s profit margins, Sheridan warned. It’s unclear what the departure of key engineering talent spells for the future of HTC, which once ranked among the world’s top smartphone makers but lost share to Apple, Samsung and Chinese manufacturers like Huawei. It’s since waded into virtual reality with the Vive headset. HTC had been working with an adviser to explore selling its handset or virtual reality businesses, and Google had been talking with the company, Bloomberg reported last month. HTC Chairwoman Cher Wang told reporters the company is remaining in the smartphone business even after the Google deal. She said it still plans to release a new flagship smartphone for 2018, without elaborating. Shares of the Taoyuan City, Taiwan-based company were suspended from trading. They have fallen more than 12 percent this year. Evercore worked with HTC as financial advisor, while Lazard advised Google. “The bright side is that HTC can focus on its VR business. They have very high hopes for VR and are trying very hard to improve user experience and enrich content,” Canalys’ Low said.

Cape Town – the JSE struggled to get ahead on Thursday following a delayed start to the trading day due to technical issues at the exchange. The repo rate was left unchanged at 6.75% with Reserve Bank governor, Lesetja Kganyago, citing political risks, the prospect of further sovereign credit-ratings downgrades, and electricity tariff hikes as reasons to keep the rate unchanged. The rand firmed on the back of the decision, gaining 0.34% to R13.28 against the dollar. A higher interest rate attracts investors to fixed income instruments in South Africa, increasing demand for the rand. The All-share index gained 0.13%, while the blue-chip Top 40 moved 0.11% higher. Markets were supported by Industrials, which gained 0.26% and Resources which climbed 0.26%. Gold miners came under severe pressure after the price of gold softened below $1 300/oz, which saw the overall index fall by 4.89%. Harmony Gold [JSE:HAR] fell by 8.31% to R23.84 a share, while Sibanye Stillwater [JSE:SGL] dropped 5.47% to R15.22. Anglogold [JSE:ANG] moved 5.33% lower to R121.38 and Goldfields [JSE:GFI] closed 3.7% lower at R57.35. Sasol [JSE:SOL] regained some of yesterday’s losses and edged up 1.34% to R378.00. The company announced that it would introduce a new broad based black economic transaction that would add 20% direct ownership in Sasol South Africa. The deal is set to replace the previous ‘Inzalo’ scheme which was implemented in 2008 and matures in June 2018. The ‘Inzalo’ deal was dependent of the share price of Sasol, and if the current price range prevails, there will be no transfer of ownership and a cash deficit. At the end of June 2017, Sasol had R12bn in debt arising from preference shares issued by Inzalo BEE entities. The Sasol shares held as security for this debt had a spot value of around R9.5bn. Sasol consolidates the debt on its balance sheet and the deficit is R4 per Sasol share. To introduce the new deal, dubbed ‘Khanyisa’, Sasol must issue approximately 34 million shares to raise cash to repurchase Inzalo entity shares and fund the deficit in Inzalo. This will only happen after shareholder’s vote on the new transaction in November. The new issue is 5% of the current shares in current issue. In the United States, the FOMC held the Federal Funds rate steady but still expects to hike one more time between now and year-end. The central bank will also begin to trim back its balance sheet next month with a $10bn reduction. The price of gold retreated by 0.70% to $1 292/oz on Thursday, following a decline in the previous two sessions. The timing of the Federal Reserve decision to unwind an inflated balance sheet has led to a dollar rally which has subsequently curbed appetite for the precious metal. Brent Crude prices held steady at $56.28/bbl as traders await American oil rig data, to determine the level of supply available. Oil stockpiles in the US have come under pressure as the recent spate of hurricanes has knocked out a large amount of the US refining capacity, pressuring supply levels of petrol.

JP Morgan’s chief executive, Jamie Dimon, might be getting into some trouble with Swedish financial authorities for market abuse when he called bitcoin a “fraud” last week. Just recently JP Morgan Chase chief executive Jamie Dimon got the cryptocurrency community all riled up when he called bitcoin a “fraud.” Further, after Dimon’s statements and bitcoin markets slumped, JP Morgan Securities Ltd., purchased a bunch of bitcoin-based exchange-traded notes for its clients. Now according to reports, an algorithmic liquidity provider headquartered in London called, Blockswater says Dimon breached certain statutes from the European Union’s Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) articles. Blockswater believes Dimon abused the market by giving out misleading information in order to influence the price for the company’s own interests. Market manipulation is a criminal offense within EU laws after being harmonized by the Financial Services and Markets Act seventeen years ago. The UK liquidity provider believes something smells fishy between Dimon’s recent bitcoin statements and JP Morgan buying up BTC-notes for clients after the price dip. “Jamie Dimon’s public assertions did not only affect the reputation of bitcoin, they harmed the interests of some of his own clients and many young businesses that are working hard to create a better financial system,” said Blockswater executive Florian Schweitzer. The company says it has filed a ‘market abuse’ report with the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority, after JP Morgan’s team purchased bitcoin derivative notes for clients on the Stockholm-based exchange Nasdaq Nordic. Schweitzer says the fact that JP Morgan purchased the bitcoin exchange-traded notes before and after the chief executive’s public statements, it “smells like market manipulation.” According to the news outlet City A.M., the Blockswater startup’s daily operations deal with blockchain-based assets like bitcoin. The publication’s columnist Courtney Goldsmith reached out to JP Morgan for comment, but the company declined to provide a statement.

BoB it will be, they do bitcoin right

Good point, cheapest place to buy a Raspberry Pi?

I want to have it all in one, a single unit and because I want to drop the unit in a crowded place, open network and spread the word of cthulhu That's why I thought it should be easy-ish?

That will depend, I'm going to buy a router specifically for this so first want to know if this is possible and if it is what router will be required and then I buy that router.

The Eskom Inquiry may have been postponed, but the momentum that is gathering against the forces of state capture cannot be stopped, say academics Anton Eberhard and Catrina Godinho. SOUTH Africans have witnessed the rallying of civil society, investigative journalists, academia, public leaders and concerned citizens who have come together to expose an overwhelming and growing body of evidence around the mechanics of state capture. The pending Eskom Inquiry is set to take that to a new level. The Eskom Inquiry may have been postponed, but the momentum that is gathering against the forces of state capture cannot be stopped. Speaking at the UCT Graduate School of Business (GSB) on Tuesday, former finance minister Pravin Gordhan reminded us that there is can be no middle ground on the issue. South Africans need to get more involved in exposing the issues around state capture and mobilising against them. Our shared heritage is one of struggle in the face of injustice and this story of injustice is one that has the potential to not only undo the legacy of the ANC, but also the promise of a democratic South Africa. As academics, we have heeded this call. On Tuesday we launched our first piece of work addressing these issues, a reference booklet designed to support the Eskom Inquiry. The booklet details how the governance of Eskom was repurposed and rent-seeking opportunities centralised to allow a politically-connected elite to unlawfully benefit from procurement deals. This work is part of a larger academic initiative – the State Capacity Research Project – convened by Prof Mark Swilling, which clearly shows that we are not dealing with random or isolated incidences of corruption, but the actions of an organised and well-connected syndicate that is systematically extracting large sums of money from the South African fiscus. With annual revenues nearly three times that of Transnet and six times SAA’s, Eskom is by far the most economically important and largest state-owned company in South Africa. This has made the utility particularly vulnerable to corrupt interests and it is therefore also a good place to start the process of delving more deeply into the mechanics of state capture. With the benefit of hindsight, it is easy to see how the story at Eskom unfolded. Shortly after Zuma ascended to the presidency in 2009, he expressed an unusual degree of interest in board and management appointments to Eskom and Transnet. Public enterprises minister Barbara Hogan, who resisted dubious board appointments, was swiftly replaced by Malusi Gigaba. Seemingly more yielding, one of his first moves was to overturn a procurement decision that the Eskom executive and board had signed off on - the replacement of Koeberg steam generators. Soon after, Gigaba gutted the Eskom board and agreed to new appointments - most of whom had no corporate or electricity sector experience. This was in stark contrast to the previous board which, led by Reuel Khosa, had provided relatively stable and strong leadership in Eskom over the preceding decade. Eskom’s CEO at the time, Brian Dames, came under extreme pressure from Gigaba and was eventually replaced by Collin Matjila as acting CEO in March 2014, against then Eskom chairman Zola Tsotsi’s advice. Subsequently published #GuptaLeaks emails revealed that just days before the appointment was made, Gupta lieutenant Salim Essa circulated Matjila’s CV to Tony ‘Rajesh’ Gupta and Duduzane Zuma. President Zuma’s second term generated more aggressive governance changes to further grease the wheels of rent-seeking at Eskom. Lynne Brown replaced Gigaba as Minister of Public Enterprises in May 2014. Matjila had already signed the controversial R43 million deal with the Gupta’s New Age newspaper, and further used his time as acting CEO to sabotage the Koeberg steam generator tender and an IT contract that could have saved Eskom a billion rand - instead favouring T-Systems, a company lobbied for by Gupta associate Salim Essa. Ending Matjila’s run on the utility, Brown appointed the former DG of Public Enterprises, Tshediso Matona, CEO in October 2014. Unfortunately for him, she also appointed a new board that December – full of Gupta associates. In January 2015, Matona launched a tender for the provision of forensic and anti-corruption consultation services for Eskom – later awarded to Dentons law firm – which proved to be his downfall. March that year saw the shock suspension of four executives – including Matona – followed by the ousting of Tsotsi as Eskom’s chair just a few weeks later. This was clearly not the move of a fledgling board and appears to have been orchestrated from the highest level. President Zuma not only personally called the DG of Public Enterprises to put this in motion (Brown was in Dubai at the time), but also summoned Tsotsi to his Durban residence where Dudu Myeni relayed the President’s instructions. Ben Ngubane, a favourite of the President, was then appointed board chairman, despite previous efforts by the ANC to prevent this. Brown also agreed to second Brian Molefe, along with his right hand man Anoj Singh, from Transnet. Dentons’ contract was terminated just two months after their investigation began and the ever self-proclaimed victim of misinformation, Minister Brown, withheld the report – containing the names of guilty parties and damning evidence of their wrongdoing – from parliament and the public. Brown also kept the report from the Eskom war room and Deputy President Ramaphosa, who had been charged by cabinet with restoring electricity supply security and improving governance at state-owned companies. This greatly undermined this critical work. The governance of Eskom thus captured and repurposed, the next period witnessed the scaling up of grand corruption, with the Guptas now brazenly managing the complex enterprise of brokering and money laundering. The most boldfaced examples include Eskom’s facilitating and financing of the Gupta’s acquisition of Glencore’s Optimum. First, coal major Glencore was driven into ‘business rescue’ by Gigaba. And while it was being shaken down, the Gupta’s Tegeta benefited from an Eskom guarantee (R1.6bn), a hefty and unusual pre-payment (R600m), and additional lucrative coal contracts – effectively enabling it to buy Optimum. It is a story that has been well told by investigative journalists notably at Amabhungane, who have done excellent work in connecting the dots of state capture. Another well understood story is that of how Eskom funnelled at least R500m to the advisory firm Trillian – majority owned by Essa. An independent review – which Eskom lied about and ignored – flagged these deals as irregular. But Trillian was not only used as a conduit to transmit money to Gupta-connected networks, it was also used to legitimise irregular Eskom processes, including the awarding of the multi-billion-rand tender for the refurbishment of Duvha power station boilers to Dongfang (since interdicted by the courts). More remains in the shadows and further instances of Gupta-favoured coal contracts and the squeezing out of major coal-miners will undoubtedly be revealed in Parliament’s inquiry. This will confirm what we know already; Eskom is in trouble. Burgeoning costs, arguably propelled by rent-seeking and corruption, have resulted in electricity tariffs increasing by more than 400% over the past decade, while electricity services have deteriorated. The effects of this on the SA economy and prospects for economic development and transformation hardly need to be spelled out. Ultimately, any project to repurpose Eskom’s governance to facilitate systematic corruption in the power sector undermines and threatens the utility’s financial viability and its ability to power South Africa’s economy and improve the welfare of all its citizens. Parliament’s Inquiry is positioned to further illuminate how Eskom has come to where it is today, and hold those responsible to account. Hopefully it will also recommend improvements to governance, not just at Eskom but at all of our state owned companies. Whatever the outcome, South Africans are going to be watching the process closely. Anton Eberhard is a professor and Catrina Godinho a PhD candidate at the UCT Graduate School of Business. Source: http://www.fin24.com/Opinion/joining-the-dots-eskom-and-the-state-capture-story-20170915

Cape Town - Pick n Pay, one of South Africa’s largest retailers, has successful trialed letting customers pay for groceries using the cryptocurrency Bitcoin. The retailer, together with tech companies Electrum and Luno, piloted letting staff pay for groceries via Bitcoin at its head office in Cape Town. "We designed a process from user registration, tender acceptance at point of sale to funds authorisation, currency exchange in real time during the transaction and instant payment settlement,” said Richard van Rensburg, Pick n Pay's deputy CEO. The pilot programme was limited to one store and is no longer active. While Pick n Pay did not say whether, or when, every-day customers would be able to pay with Bitcoin at its stores, Van Rensburg described the cryptocurrency as a "game changer for the retail industry". “Our pilot resulted in a transaction that was safe - there is no cash risk and no card fraud risk,” he said. Early days Van Rensburg said that cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (there are hundreds more) were still in "relative infancy" but would in time be accepted by the retail industry. "It will take some time before they become widely accepted as a form of tender. Progress is unlikely to be hampered by technology, but rather by regulatory issues and concerns," he said. He said the pilot was also conducted to give the company's new point of sale technology a test run. An "open interface" at the point of sale - where customers pay - would enable third party providers to "bring new services and capabilities to our customers,” he said, but did not provide details. Cape Town-based software company Electrum helped set up the system to process the payments. "The checkout process is as simple as scanning a QR code using a Bitcoin wallet app on the customer’s smartphone," it said in a blog post on its website. Electrum said the Bitcoin infrastructure for the project was provided by Luno. Previously known as BitX, Luno allows people to buy and sell Bitcoin and store the cryptocurrency in its Luno wallet.

JOHANNESBURG, Sept 19 (Reuters) - A South African broker and an energy investment firm fired KPMG on Tuesday, two of a number of local firms weighing whether to ditch the auditor to distance themselves from a scandal involving business friends of President Jacob Zuma. Sasfin and Hulisani, both relatively small financial companies based in Johannesburg, announced they would drop KPMG due to reputational risk. KPMG, one of the biggest and most influential names in accounting, cleared out its South African leadership on Friday after it found that work done for firms owned by the Gupta family "fell considerably short" of its standards. It found no evidence of crimes or corruption, however. "In view of the well-publicised concerns recently raised with regard to KPMG as well as Sasfin's commitment to good governance in respect of auditor independence and auditor tenure, Sasfin has decided to put its audit out to tender," the company said in a statement. Hulisani said it would ask shareholders to approve its decision to replace KPMG with PwC at a meeting next month. Fund manger Sygnia fired KPMG a month ago. Several South African companies approached by Reuters over the last week, including blue chips Barclays Africa and Old Mutual, said they were considering cutting ties with KPMG. "They've placed their clients in a difficult position. If their audits were not up to standards on the Gupta account, why should I believe they were up to standard on my account?," Sygnia chief executive Magda Wierzycka told Reuters on Monday. "What happens to KPMG from this point onwards really depends on what corporate South Africa does." Barclays Africa, South Africa's third largest lender by market value and one of KPMG's biggest clients, has met the firm to request more information on its internal investigation before making a call on whether to sever ties. "After carefully considering the further information requested and the findings, (Barclays Africa) will be in a position to make a decision as to whether to continue to engage KPMG as its external auditors," the bank said. KPMG is the third global firm to face questions about its work for the Indian-born Gupta brothers, who have been accused by an anti-graft watchdog of unduly influencing the awarding of government contracts. Consulting giant McKinsey is being investigated by South Africa's parliamentary committee on public enterprises, and the British business of public relations agency Bell Pottinger collapsed last week following a scandal over a racially-charged political campaign it ran for the Guptas in South Africa. The Guptas and Zuma deny wrongdoing and say they are victims of a politically motivated witch-hunt. The Guptas and their companies have not been charged with any crime. BOARD MEETINGS CALLED Anglo-South African investment bank and asset manager Investec's audit committee was due to meet later in the week to make a recommendation to the board on whether to keep KPMG. Mining company Sibanye Stillwater, whose chief executive Neal Froneman has called for Zuma to step down, and Africa's biggest properly group Growthpoint will also hold board meetings to decide on whether to keep the firm. They declined to give exact dates for the meetings. "The report came out on Friday so it would be premature to say we will fire them. The board will meet in due course to make a decision," spokesman James Wellsted told Reuters. Other companies considering whether to drop KPMG include Anglo-South African insurer Old Mutual and its banking unit Nedbank. "Old Mutual is committed to doing business ethically and maintaining the highest standards of governance," spokesperson Ursula Westhuizen said. "We understand that the conclusions of KPMG's review will be available at the end of this month and we look forward to its publication." South Africa's Institute of Directors, which represents all company directors in South Africa, earlier this month suspended ties with KPMG and, among other things, declined to sponsor a golf day set for October. Save South Africa, a civil society group, has called on local companies to fire KPMG. Iraj Abedian resigned as a director of Germany's Munich Re's African unit because the unit would not fire the accounting firm. DAUNTING TASK KPMG's South African unit traces its roots to Johannesburg's gold rush days in the late 19th century, when Scottish-born Alexander Aiken established a practice as a public accountant and auditor. KPMG acquired the firm in the 1980s. New chief executive Nhlamu Dlomu, who replaced Trevor Hoole on Friday, faces a daunting task retaining both government and private sector clients and convincing them that it can still carry on auditing large corporations despite the Friday purge. KPMG Global Chairman John Veihmeyer apologised for the firm's failings in South Africa and said further action would be taken if new information came to light. "This is not who we are," he said in a statement on Tuesday. The spokesman for KPMG's local unit Nqubeko Sibiya said Dlomu would not be available for interviews as she has just started her new role. "On the one hand you could say they've cleaned up shop, but on the other hand, they've dismissed the entire executive team. Who is there to serve the existing clients and take on those leadership roles?" said Sygnia's Wierzycka. Andrew Cranston, former KPMG Russia head, has been brought over to replace chief operating officer Steven Louw. In addition to Hoole, Louw, chairman Ahmed Jaffer and five senior partners who all resigned on Friday, the accounting firm also plans to dismiss Jacques Wessels, the lead partner on audits of Gupta-linked firms. The South African tax collection agency, SARS, said on Monday it would cut all ties with KPMG, accusing it of "unethical" and unlawful" behaviour. KPMG acknowledged "flaws" in a report that it compiled for SARS which implied that former finance minister Pravin Gordhan had helped set up a "rogue spy unit" when he was head of the service. (Additional reporting by Nqobile Dludla and Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo; Editing by Louise Heavens, Mark Potter and Sonya Hepinstall)

Would it be possible to install Apache on a router? What I want to do is have a router with an open network and when people connect to it it takes them to a website hosted on the router. So the idea is to load the website on a USB and have the router serve it to guests.

Toys “R” Us filed for bankruptcy as the retailer, loaded with debt in a buyout more than a decade ago, failed to keep consumers from abandoning its stores for the lower prices and convenience of online shopping. The company filed Chapter 11 documents late Monday in US Bankruptcy Court in Richmond, Virginia. The chain secured $3 billion in debtor-in-possession financing to stay open while it restructures, according to a company statement. The bankruptcy filing is the latest blow to a brick-and-mortar retail industry reeling from store closures, sluggish mall traffic and the threat of Amazon.com. More than a dozen major retailers have filed for creditor protection this year, including Payless, Gymboree and Perfumania Holdings, all of which are using the Chapter 11 process to close underperforming stores and expand online operations. Much of the toy merchant’s debt is the legacy of a $7.5 billion leveraged buyout in 2005 in which Bain Capital, KKR & Co. and Vornado Realty Trust loaded the company with debt to take it private. Since then, the Wayne, New Jersey-based chain has struggled to dig itself out. Chief Executive Officer David Brandon took over Toys “R” Us in 2015 and sought to make shopping there a more enjoyable experience. Last year, he set out a vision of kids “dragging their parents to our stores because they want to see what’s going on.” The retailer introduced the “Hot Toy Finder,” which tells customers exactly where in their local store to find the items featured on its “Holiday Hot Toy List.” The chain, which has provided the annual list of the 50 hottest toys for 20 years, also offered price matching and free layaway. While Brandon made some progress reducing liabilities, he ultimately was unable to resuscitate the closely held chain’s fortunes. The company reported a net loss of $164 million in the quarter ended April 29, compared to $126 million for the same period in the prior year. It hasn’t shown an annual profit since 2013. The company sells toy and baby merchandise in more than 1,500 Toys “R” Us and Babies “R” Us locations worldwide and through websites including Toysrus.com and Babiesrus.com. Charles Lazarus opened Children’s Bargain Town, a baby-furniture store, in Washington in 1948, according to the Toys “R” Us website. He added toys two years later and opened the first Toys “R” Us, modeled after self-service supermarkets, in 1957. Lazarus stepped down as chairman and CEO in 1994. Two years later, the first babies “R” Us opened.

Just noticed on the live chat, that the first share I owned was Trustco, bought on EasyEquities weeks after they opened. What was your first share/investment and what was the platform?

I would use it I shop at Pick n Pay regularly so maybe on a good day when BTC is up ill spend some there. (I still think it's a bit early/unwise to get rid of your bitcoins at this stage. For us in a functional country.) Getting off topic, but for someone in Argentina or Zimbabwe or Cyprus bitcoin is probably a necessity for them and is wise to use it for day to day living, but in SA for the time being whilst we still have a functional economy rather buy more bitcoin and keep it as the value goes up, buy it as gold.

In a SEC regulated paradigm, this would be called Market Manipulation. Dimon also said he'd "fire in a second" any JP Morgan trader who was trading bitcoin, noting two reasons: "It's against our rules and they are stupid." He also said it was a fraud. Yet JPM were the biggest buyers of Bitcoin yesterday. I’m surprised that today there isn’t a class action law suit sitting at the gates of JPM. Did Jamie change the rules? Did he inform JPM board members and stockholders what these rules were or that they had changed? Did they participate in this so-called “fraud”? What does that mean for them as a public ally traded company?

No no you said without main stream adoption where BTC is used for actual transactions what's the purpose of except serving as digital gold. So I explained my view on it how I see bitcoin as a currency and of course use it to do actual transactions. Explaining a scenario that I believe will be how bitcoin is used. Right now it is gold everyone is buying and storing it, that won't be the case 10 years from now. I don't argue with the rest, most ICOs in general is a scam hence the crackdown. Bitcoin is already free of fiat, but it will become more apparent as more and more people and places start to adopt it, if I earn and spend in bitcoin the only reason I'll ever look at it for fiat is if I need something from a local shop who for some odd reason don't accept bitcoin.