A multispeed recovery

We expect that economic growth in Sub-Saharan Africa will continue to accelerate in 2018. This recovery will be driven largely by faster growth in the region’s three biggest economies – Nigeria, South Africa, and Angola – all of which have suffered slowdowns in recent years. Indeed our views on South Africa are significantly more bullish than the very down-beat consensus forecast. Performance elsewhere in the region will be mixed, but we expect that growth will accelerate in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Ghana. African currencies will continue to depreciate in 2018, but will probably do so at a gentler pace than in 2017. Overall, we expect that firmer currencies and better rains will cause inflation to slow. This will allow central banks across Africa to continue their loosening cycles next year, providing another boost to growth.