Afreximbank Says Fitch Rating Cut Based on ‘Erroneous View'

African Export-Import Bank lashed out at Fitch Ratings saying its decision to cut its assessment to one step above junk with a negative outlook was based on a false premise.
Fitch last week downgraded Afreximbank to BBB- from BBB, one step above the speculative level that would limit the pool of funds allowed to invest in its debt, flagging concerns that the Cairo-based bank's loans to Zambia and Ghana may need to take losses in ongoing debt restructuring exercises.

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Yahoo

21 minutes ago

• Yahoo

5 AI stocks to consider buying and holding for the long term

Many AI applications are still in development, offering ground-floor buying opportunities in their stocks. Below are some established companies that five of contract writers like as investments to consider buying to capitalise on this transformational technology. What it does: Alphabet is a global technology company best known for Google, YouTube, Android, and cloud services. By Mark Hartley. When considering an AI investment for the long term, Google's parent company Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOG) stands out. It has emerged as a key player in the AI space, leveraging its vast data resources and computational power to dig deep roots into the industry. Through DeepMind and its Gemini AI models, Alphabet is at the forefront of generative AI development. Google Cloud offers scalable AI tools and infrastructure for businesses, while AI enhancements in products like Search, Gmail, and YouTube are well-positioned to benefit from advertising revenue. Alphabet's expansive ecosystem gives it a strategic advantage in training and deploying AI models at scale. A significant risk, however, lies in the potential disruption of its core search business. As AI chatbots and generative search become more prevalent, traditional search advertising could face margin pressure. Additionally, if faces increased regulatory scrutiny on data usage, antitrust concerns and competition from rivals like Microsoft and Amazon. Mark Hartley doesn't own shares in any of the stocks mentioned. What it does: Cellebrite is the global leader in decrypting mobile phones and other devices supporting digital forensic investigations. By Zaven Boyrazian. Many AI stocks today are unproven. That's why I prefer established players leveraging AI to improve their existing mission-critical products like Cellebrite (NASDAQ:CLBT). Cellebrite specialises in extracting encrypted data from mobile phones and other devices aiding law enforcement and enterprises in criminal and cybersecurity investigations. Over 90% of crime commited today has a digital element. And when it comes to decrypting mobile phones, Cellebrite is the global gold standard. The company is now leveraging AI to analyse encrypted data – drastically accelerating a task that's historically been increadibly labour intensive identifying patterns, discovering connections, and establishing leads. Most of Cellebrite's revenue comes from law enforcement, exposing Cellebrite to the risk of budget cuts. In fact, fears of lower US federal spending is why the stock dropped sharply in early 2025. And with a premium valuation, investors can expect more volatility moving forward. But in the long run, Cellebrite has what it takes to be an AI winner in my mind. That's why I've already bought shares. Zaven Boyrazian owns shares in Cellebrite. What it does: Dell Technologies provides a broad range of IT products and services and is an influential player in AI. By Royston Wild. Dell Technologies (NYSE:DELL) isn't one of the more fashionable names in the realm of artificial intelligence (AI). The good news is that this means it trades at a whopping discount to many of its peers. For this financial year (to January 2026), City analysts think earnings will soar 41% year on year, leaving it on a price-to-earnings (P/E) multiple of 12.6 times. Such readings are as rare as hen's teeth in the high-growth tech industry. In addition, Dell shares also trade on a price-to-earnings growth (PEG) ratio of 0.3 for this year. Any reading below 1 implies a share is undervalued. These modest readings fail to reflect the exceptional progress the company's making in AI, in my opinion. Indeed, Dell last month raised guidance for the current quarter as it announced 'unprecedented demand for our AI-optimised servers' during January-March. It booked $12.1bn in AI orders in the last quarter alone, beating the entire total for the last financial year. Dell is a major supplier of server infrastructure that let Nvidia's high-power chips do their thing. Dell's shares could sink if unfavourable developments in the ongoing tariff wars transpire. But the company's low valuation could help limit the scale of any falls. Royston Wild does not own shares in Dell or Nvidia. What it does: Salesforce is a customer relationship management (CRM) software company that is developing AI agents. By Edward Sheldon, CFA. We've all seen the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) in recent years. Using apps like ChatGPT and Gemini, we can do a lot of amazing things today. These apps are just the start of the AI story, however. I expect the next chapter to be about AI agents – software programmes that can complete tasks autonomously and increase business productivity exponentially. One company that is active in this space is Salesforce (NYSE: CRM). It's a CRM software company that has recently developed an agentic AI offering for businesses called 'Agentforce'. It's still early days here. But already the company is having a lot of success with this offering, having signed up 8,000 customers since the product's launch last October. Now, Salesforce is not the only company developing AI agents. So, competition from rivals is a risk. I like the fact that the company's software is already embedded in over 150,000 organisations worldwide though. This could potentially give it a major competitive advantage in the agentic AI race. Edward Sheldon has positions in Salesforce. What it does: Salesforce is a cloud-based software company specialising in customer relationship management, helping businesses manage sales, marketing, support, and data. By Ben McPoland. I think Salefsforce (NYSE: CRM) looks well set up to benefit in the age of AI. Specifically, its Agentforce platform, which lets businesses deploy AI agents to handle various tasks, could be the company's next big growth engine. By the end of April, it had already closed over 8,000 deals, just six months after launching Agentforce. Half of those were paid deals, taking its combined data cloud and AI annual recurring revenue above $1bn. Granted, that looks like small potatoes set against the $41.2bn in sales it's expected to generate this fiscal year. But it's still very early days, and management reckons the digital labour market opportunity could run into the trillions of dollars. Of course, it's always best to treat such mind-boggling projections with a healthy dose of scepticism. And the company does face stiff competition in the AI agent space, especially from Microsoft and ServiceNow. Nevertheless, I'm bullish here. Salesforce is already deeply embedded in sales, service, and marketing. Its AI agents slot into existing workflows, which I think will prove to be a big advantage over unproven AI upstarts. Ben McPoland owns shares of Salesforce. The post 5 AI stocks to consider buying and holding for the long term appeared first on The Motley Fool UK. More reading 5 Stocks For Trying To Build Wealth After 50 One Top Growth Stock from the Motley Fool John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. The Motley Fool UK has recommended Alphabet, Amazon, Cellebrite, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Salesforce. Views expressed on the companies mentioned in this article are those of the writer and therefore may differ from the official recommendations we make in our subscription services such as Share Advisor, Hidden Winners and Pro. Here at The Motley Fool we believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. Motley Fool UK 2025 Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data

Yahoo

40 minutes ago

• Yahoo

Warren Buffett's Top Recommendation for Investors Could Turn $500 Per Month Into $100,000 in 10 Years.

Buffett shares a lot of investment advice in his shareholder letters and annual meetings. He recommends one investment for most people, including the executor of his estate. If you consistently add to your portfolio, you could have six figures within a decade of starting. 10 stocks we like better than Vanguard S&P 500 ETF › Warren Buffett is happy to share investment advice with anyone who's interested. His annual letters to shareholders and extended question-and-answer sessions at Berkshire Hathaway's annual meetings are incomparable sources of wisdom. Buffett has been a great guide for countless successful investors who like to pick great companies, not just great stocks. But the Oracle of Omaha's top recommendation for most investors is to ignore a lot of that and keep things as simple as possible. That's because it's often the behavioral challenges of investing in individual companies that trip up those who would otherwise be successful. Buying or selling a great company at the wrong price at the wrong time is a path to underperformance. Here's what Buffett recommends instead. One of the easiest ways for investors to avoid the behavioral tripwires that can lead to lagging the stock market is to stop trying to outperform the market average in the first place. That's why Buffett's top recommendation for average investors is to put money in an index fund. He prefers the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSEMKT: VOO). Buffett plans to take his own advice, too. He instructed the executor of his estate to put 90% of his wealth in the index fund after his passing. If you consistently put aside $500 of your paycheck every month, you could be sitting on a six-figure portfolio 10 years from now, even if you're starting from nothing. Buffett doesn't think dollar-cost averaging is for active stock pickers. While he doesn't try to time the market, he does try to value companies. Buying a company's stock without regard for its value (as dictated by a dollar-cost averaging strategy) won't lead to the outperformance stock pickers seek. But when it comes to passive investing, the best way to get the most out of your money is to put all your money into the fund and consistently add to it over time with money from your earnings. Earning average returns for a long time can produce above-average wealth. The S&P 500 expanded to a 500-constituent format in March of 1957. Since then, the broad-based index has gone on to produce a compound average annual total return of 10.5%. That return is achieved by reinvesting dividends, which most brokerages allow you to do automatically. If you set up a brokerage account and automatically purchase $500 of the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF every month while reinvesting dividends, here's what you can expect if you earn average returns from the last 70 years. Years Investing Expected Value of Portfolio 1 $6,335 2 $13,335 3 $21,068 4 $29,611 5 $39,050 6 $49,477 7 $60,998 8 $73,726 9 $87,788 10 $103,324 Calculations by author. It's worth pointing out that $500 per month, or $6,000 per year, is less than the annual contribution limit for an IRA. That will ensure you keep your investments tax-deferred or even tax-free. While the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF doesn't have a history of capital gains distributions, investors still have to pay taxes on its income distributions from dividends. Those usually incur a 15% qualified dividend tax, so there's a slight tax drag. But even if you set aside 15% of each dividend distribution, you could end up with a portfolio value north of $100,000 based on average returns. If you contribute the $500 per month to an employer-sponsored retirement plan, you could end up with well over $100,000. That's because most plans include a matching contribution. While you might not have the Vanguard fund available in your plan, most include some low-cost index funds. Even with relatively high fees, that can be the easiest way to build a sizable portfolio for retirement. Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett's Vice Chairman and longtime friend, once told a young investor that the first $100,000 is the hardest. (He used more colorful language.) Once you have $100,000, you can let off the gas a bit because the returns from the portfolio will start to do some of the work for you. Indeed, if all you did was invest $500 per month for 10 years like above and let it sit for another 10 years, you'd have close to $280,000 without adding another penny. Wait 15 more years, and you'll have around $1.25 million. That's the true power of compounding, and it doesn't take any special skills or market timing knowledge to get there. Before you buy stock in Vanguard S&P 500 ETF, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Vanguard S&P 500 ETF wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $659,171!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $891,722!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 995% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 172% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of June 9, 2025 Adam Levy has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Berkshire Hathaway and Vanguard S&P 500 ETF. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Warren Buffett's Top Recommendation for Investors Could Turn $500 Per Month Into $100,000 in 10 Years. was originally published by The Motley Fool Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data

Bloomberg

an hour ago

• Bloomberg

Odd Lots: Giuseppe Paleologo on Quant Investing at Multi-Strat Hedge Funds

Quantitative investing is one of those terms that you hear all the time, but there's various explanations of what it actually means, or how quants actually make money. And of course, the term means different things in different contexts. In this live episode, recorded at the Bloomberg Equity Intelligence Summit on June 12, we speak again with Giuseppe Paleologo, the head of quantitative research at Balyasny Asset Management. We talk about his role, what quant investing actually is, and what the future of the space actually entails.