Trading of Fertiglobe’s shares is due to begin tomorrow on the ADX, after the fertilizer producer raised some USD 795 mn in an IPO last week with an offering of a 13.8% stake at AED 2.55 apiece, according to its prospectus. The listing was 22x oversubscribed and made the company third largest by market cap on the ADX, valuing its shares at USD 5.8 bn.

VC firm STV hopes to raise at least USD 1 bn for its second Middle East-based tech fund, Bloomberg reports, citing anonymous sources close to the company. Talks are ongoing between the the outfit founded by ex-Google exec Abdulrahman Tarabzouni — who has also backed Vezeeta and Careem — and potential investors, including regional sovereign funds and international pension funds and endowments, the sources said.

A modest 0.5 percentage point rise in bond yields could see bondholders lose as much as USD 2.6 tn, Bloomberg reports, warning that the threat would impact funds across all asset classes. A half-point increase in yields would see the Bloomberg US Treasury index to lose over USD 350 bn, while the Bloomberg Global Aggregate Index would lose around USD 2.6 tn. The concern comes after yields on 10-year US treasuries rose on speculation the US Federal Reserve would raise the cost of borrowing next year.

Nigeria’s central bank has introduced its digital currency, eNaira, making the African country the latest to launch a digital counterpart to its fiat currency in a bid to shore up its payments system.

THE CLOSING BELL-

The EGX30 rose 0.5% yesterday on turnover of EGP 1.40 bn (8.1% below the 90-day average). Local investors were net buyers. The index is up 3.1% YTD.

In the green: Abou Kir Fertilizers (+10.5%), Orascom Development Egypt (+10.0%) and Egypt Kuwait Holding-EGP (+4.0%).

In the red: Fawry (-6.3%), Pioneers Properties (-2.8%) and Gadwa Industrial Development (-2.6%).

Outside of Japan (where the Nikkei is down), Asian benchmarks are just barely clinging to the green at the start of the trading week. Futures at dispatch time suggest European shares will also open (weakly) in the green later this morning, while Wall Street looks set to face selling pressure at the opening bell.