Africa rising? Not so much. Longtime readers know we’re as skeptical of the broad “Africa rising” narrative as we are of the ease with which everyone from portfolio managers (of a certain ilk) to aid types seem to want to treat the continent as if it were a single country. Nick Ndiritu, the Allan Gray PM we quote above, says the “‘Africa Rising’ narrative has been replaced by the exact opposite view of the continent.” And he’s right: The Financial Times had a solid analysis piece out this weekend suggesting that “expectations for economic growth this year in sub-Saharan Africa have plummeted to just 1.5 per cent … a fraction of the 4.2 per cent growth foreseen at the start of the year.” Why? Sharp downgrades to growth forecasts for Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Angola, the paper notes. But the concerns are even deeper when you focus on sub-Saharan Africa, as the piece does, noting that “the IMF now predicts that 2017 will be the second successive year in which sub-Saharan growth will undershoot global growth.” From legislation capping lending rates in Kenya to slumping automobile and oil production continent-wide and political headwinds in South Africa, the piece paints a gloomy picture of the year ahead for the continent.