US DFC Approves Loans for Vodafone Ukraine, Energy Giant DTEK

Kenya's High Court ruled the sale of a 15% stake in Safaricom to Vodacom was flawed, ordering its return to the government. Vodacom plans to appeal. The $1.6bn deal, completed in June, increased Vodacom's stake to 55% and reduced the government's to 20%. Safaricom is reviewing the judgment. According to NTV Kenya, the court cited lack of public involvement and concealed information.

Vodacom's shares fell 1.7% after Kenya's high court blocked its $2.1bn takeover of Safaricom, citing lack of public consultation and arbitrary valuation. Vodacom plans to appeal the ruling, which nullified the deal to acquire a 15% stake from the Kenyan government and a 5% stake from Vodafone.

Vodacom Group will appeal a Kenyan High Court ruling that invalidated the government's sale of a 15% stake in Safaricom, valued at about 204 billion Kenyan shillings. The court ordered the stake to revert to the state, citing unconstitutional transaction. Vodacom seeks to suspend the ruling pending appeal.

Berenberg upgraded GSK to 'buy' with a £22 target, citing strong growth prospects and undervaluation. Deutsche Bank upgraded AstraZeneca to 'hold' with a 11,700p target, noting improved risk-reward. Citi raised Vodafone's target to 127p, highlighting potential positive catalysts. Analysts cited pipeline momentum, valuation gaps, and upcoming catalysts for these moves.

Vodafone Egypt and Cassava Technologies launched Egypt's first AI factory, investing EGP 20B ($300M) this fiscal year. The facility offers AI services using NVIDIA hardware, with data hosted locally. Egypt is courting multiple global partners, including Konecta, Deloitte, and NVIDIA, to diversify its AI infrastructure. Cassava, backed by NVIDIA and Google, is expanding into North Africa with this project.

Vodafone, Cassava Technologies (founded by Strive Masiyiwa), and Cairo-listed Elsewedy Electric agreed to build Egypt's first AI data centre, expecting $1B in FDI. The project, with initial $200M investment, will create jobs and use Nvidia GPUs. Cassava is Nvidia's African cloud partner, and Google, Nvidia have invested in it. Elsewedy Electric, controlled by the El Sewedy family, provides power and infrastructure.