- The Daily Brief, by The Kenyan Wall Street
- Posts
- It'll be Donald Trump's World Soon, Kenya's Economic Slump Continues
It'll be Donald Trump's World Soon, Kenya's Economic Slump Continues
Here's what you need to know to start your week
Kenyan Wall Street
January 13, 2025
Direct to your inbox every Monday at 9am (EAT)
What's Inside
It’ll be Trump’s World Soon
In a week, Donald J Trump will be sworn in as the President of the United States for his second and final term, four years after the Republican lost the elections to incumbent Joe Biden.
Trump’s triumphant return to the White House has already caused ripples across the world, with markets reacting positively to news of his win in November, and geopolitical shifts beginning to take shape in anticipation.
As the new Republican administration takes shape, and given Trump’s iconic insular politics, it is likely that there will be significant shifts in US-Africa relations in 2025.
In East Africa, US Ambassador to Kenya Meg Whitman resigned in late 2024, in what regional pundits so as her getting ahead of her eventual replacement.
Among her wins during her term was getting Kenyan police deployed on a UN-sanctioned mission to pacify Haiti, which the US is largely funding and whose future will depend on how Trump views its importance.
Among the final acts of the Biden administration was placing sanctions on Sudan’s paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and its leader Mohammed “Hemedti” Dagalo in January.
The move is likely to reshape the RSF’s support system, which stretches from the region to the Gulf, and could tip the scales in favor of the Sudanese Army. But it could also worsen the conflict, as multiple interests in the region attract multiple external players.
Regional pundits view Trump as likely to officially recognise the semi-autonomous region of Somaliland, which is at the center of a feud between Mogadishu and Addis Ababa. But in recent times, Somalia’s president, who is part of anti-Addis Ababa tripartite with Eritrea and Egypt, has visited Ethiopia. The two neighbours are engaged in a fractious dispute about Ethiopia’s deployment in the next AU peacekeeping force in Somalia, with Egypt, a key US ally in Africa and the Middle East, playing the role of a wedge.
Trump’s return, and his initial moves once he’s back in Washington, will likely reshape East Africa and the Horn in immeasurable ways.
Stay updated on this on The Kenyan Wall Street.
“The intelligent investor is a realist who sells to optimists and buys from pessimists.”
― Benjamin Graham
Kenya’s Economy Slows Down to 4% amid Construction Slump
Kenya’s economy expanded by 4% in the third quarter of 2024, a slowdown from 6% recorded in the same period in 2023 and the slowest in four years, dragged by notable contractions in key sectors such as construction, mining, and quarrying.
The Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) attributed the deceleration to a general decline in growth in most sectors with contractions in the construction, mining and quarrying sectors.
The growth, which compares to 4.6% recorded in the second quarter of 2024, was the slowest since the first quarter of 2021, below the central bank’s forecast of 5.2%.
Overall growth was supported by resilient performance from sectors including agriculture, forestry and fishing which expanded by 4.2% albeit slower than the 4.8% recorded in Q2 constrained by a decline in tea production.
The construction sector was hard hit, recording a 2% contraction compared to a 4% growth in 2023 and 2.9% in the second quarter of 2024, triggered by higher costs of building materials and government budget cuts towards construction projects.
“The decelerated growth was largely due to a general decline in growth in most sectors of the economy. The growth was constrained by contractions in Construction and Mining and Quarrying activities,” KNBS noted in the quarterly report.
Interview of the Week
Have a great week!