Eskom Loss: South Africa’s Eskom faces its seventh consecutive full-year loss burdened by debt, operational inefficiencies and unpaid municipal bills. https://bloom.bg/3uYjtta

Gas wealth: Mozambique's Finance Minister plans to establish a sovereign wealth fund to manage an anticipated $91.7 billion in future natural-gas export revenue. https://bloom.bg/3uZd5lt

Economic tightrope: A sharp decline in fuel prices eased South Africa's inflation, but persistent pressure from other sectors prompts central bank caution. https://bloom.bg/4ag887T

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Ghana inflation: The country's inflation rate fell in November to a 19 month low, helped by aggressive monetary policy tightening by the central bank. https://bloom.bg/3v0OtJ5

Logistics: Transnet withdrew a request for quotes for an operating lease on a freight-rail artery that connects its biggest port with its industrial hub. https://bloom.bg/47QWBu6

Eskom debt: South Africa’s indebted state power utility has asked the National Treasury to convert 16 billion rand ($840 million) of bailout funds into equity. https://bloom.bg/3t8izKd

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Patchy recovery: China's sustained economic growth remains uncertain as industrial output jumps but the property sector remains weak. https://trib.al/PiRds7S

Shifting trend: India's new millionaires are splurging on mansions in the "Beverly Hills of Dubai," marking a shift in global money flows. https://trib.al/yC9L6Ha

The Big Take: Four kids died in Colombia. More than a hundred fell ill. But the drug company keeps selling cancer medicine. Bloomberg investigates a tainted chemo medicine wound up in pediatric cancer wards. https://trib.al/uS5Eayu

India Edition: India doesn't have to choose between goods and services exports but priorities matter, say former RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan and economist Rohit Lamba. Menaka Doshi writes about the 'Amritkaal' challenge. https://trib.al/29JAfYe

Looking for insightful commentary and in-depth analyses on India? Sign up here for our weekly newsletter to stay updated with the latest reportage on billionaires and businesses behind its rise.

Ship attacks: BP said it will pause all shipments through the Red Sea following an escalation of attacks on merchant shipping by Houthi militants. https://bloom.bg/48mq9j3

Unit sale: Standard Chartered is selling its consumer-banking business unit in the Ivory Coast to West African lender Coris Bank. https://bloom.bg/4aBd2N4

DRC ballot: Voters in Democratic Republic of Congo have 26 presidential candidates to choose from on Wednesday as the country holds elections. https://bloom.bg/482SxqD

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Eskom's pollution: Coal-fired power plants operated by South Africa’s state utility are emitting pollutants that cause respiratory diseases at almost 42 times the intensity of those in China. https://bloom.bg/4aD7kdA

Bottleneck fix: Botswana has received bids from investors to build a rail line to a Namibian port that will help avoid South Africa's disintegrating logistics network. https://bloom.bg/3NxWZ8T

New planes: Ethiopian Airlines secured a $450 million loan from Citigroup to finance five new Boeing aircraft. https://bloom.bg/3v3KjjA

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Red Sea chaos: The global shipping industry is bracing for the prospect of living without its most important trade route for weeks. https://bloom.bg/3TtXpRr

IMF Deal: With Egypt’s elections over, the cash-strapped nation is poised for an increase in financial aid that may ease its dollar shortages and spur much-needed foreign investment. https://bloom.bg/41vA180

Turbulent 2024: Risks around an election expected to be the most competitive since South Africa became a democracy in 1994 cloud the outlook for its stocks next year. https://bloom.bg/3vaJiX1

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Asset freeze: Isabel dos Santos, the self-exiled daughter of former Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, had £580 million of assets frozen in a London legal spat with telecommunications firm Unitel. https://bloom.bg/3RtnpK5

Looming lift: Egypt’s first interest-rate hike since August is creeping ever-closer, although slowing inflation and the wait for a much-anticipated currency devaluation probably mean it won’t happen until 2024. https://bloom.bg/3vbmRkA

Aid pause: The United Nations’ World Food Programme has temporarily suspended assistance in some parts of Sudan’s Al-Jazirah state, where it was supporting more than 800,000 people, as fighting spreads. https://bloom.bg/473wuyY

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Ivory Coast elections: Ex-Credit Suisse CEO Tidjane Thiam’s bid to lead the opposition in presidential elections scheduled for 2025 is facing a critical test. https://bloom.bg/41A8Fxp

Cash crunch: Nigerians are hoarding cash again amid memories of a failed official campaign around this time last year to demonetize high-value naira notes. https://bloom.bg/3GV5QO6

New cabinet: President Umaro Sissoco Embalo named a new cabinet for Guinea-Bissau, days after dismissing his prime minister twice following a foiled coup. https://bloom.bg/3RAcONf

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

India consumes the world's most groundwater and that’s testing its ability to feed itself and much of the world. Flood irrigation is wasteful and inefficient, but often favored by millions of rice and wheat farmers in breadbasket states as it is inexpensive, low-tech and time-tested.

Cheap power has encouraged routine overreliance on finite riches. Over the last half century, farm productivity has leapt forward, but so, too, has water usage — up 500% over that period, according to the World Bank. For now, it’s clear the water math does not add up. https://trib.al/DKrva4s

BREAKING: Japan has issued a tsunami warning for almost all of its western coast after a powerful earthquake with a magnitude 7.6 hit off the Noto Peninsula about 300 km (190 miles) from Tokyo.

Follow here for the latest updates: https://bloom.bg/47z7Arn

📷: USGS

WATCH: A Japan Airlines plane caught fire at Tokyo's Haneda airport after colliding with another aircraft; all JAL passengers, crew evacuated. https://trib.al/jenOJRW

Access deal: Somalia recalled its envoy to Ethiopia after its landlocked neighbor signed a memorandum of understanding with a breakaway enclave giving it access to the Red Sea. https://bloom.bg/3vkJumy

Volatility increase: Iran dispatched a warship to the Red Sea after the US Navy destroyed three Houthi boats, a move that risks ratcheting up tensions. https://bloom.bg/3vlXFI8

Best new resorts: In 2024, there will be no more coveted place to stay on the African continent than the intimate Angama Amboseli in Kenya. https://bloom.bg/3voujcg

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Nikesh Arora has a habit of winning big paychecks. At Google, he became the firm’s highest-paid executive after getting a compensation package worth about $51 million in 2012. Then he was poached by SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son, amassing a $135 million first-year pay deal that broke Japanese records and made him the world’s best-paid executive.

But it's his latest stint, as CEO of cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks, that's catapulted him into the billionaire class. https://trib.al/2s22HDd

Crypto rules: Nigeria’s central bank has released inaugural guidelines for banks opening cryptocurrency accounts, while retaining its ban on them holding or trading in virtual assets on their own behalf. https://bloom.bg/3NR7cgO

Take over: Gabon plans to buy an oil company owned by the Carlyle Group by taking advantage of its right to increase its stake as an existing shareholder of the firm that pumps crude from the country. https://bloom.bg/3vmMn6u

Contentious land deal: Ethiopia wants to buy coastline from Somaliland. Does Somaliland have the right to sell it? Read more: https://bloom.bg/3S4TKr1

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

As Japan Airlines flight JL516 skidded to a fiery halt after colliding with another plane on the runway at Tokyo Haneda airport on Jan. 2, cabin crew faced a daunting scenario.

The intercom system to communicate between flight deck and cabin had broken down, one of the giant engines was still spinning and couldn’t be shut off, and only three of the eight escape doors were available to evacuate the stricken aircraft as flames licked up the kerosene-covered fuselage.

In the end, all 367 passengers and 12 crew got off the Airbus A350 alive. Given the odds, their escape is even more remarkable, the result of modern aircraft design, skilled crew and — not least — passengers who stayed calm and left their bags behind. Read how they were saved here: https://bloom.bg/3S3sH0k

📷: Jiji Press/AFP

Microsoft is adding a button to the Windows keyboard to activate its AI Copilot service, with the first devices to sport the new key available this month.

The Copilot key, which will sit to the right of the space bar, is the first change to the Windows keyboard layout since Microsoft added the Windows/Start key in 1994, underscoring the company’s commitment to artificial intelligence.

Microsoft’s hardware partners will show off Windows 11 computers with the Copilot button over the coming days at the CES technology conference and, over time, it will become a required feature. Read more: https://trib.al/oQFcbJr

📷: Microsoft

East Africa tensions: The African Union and US called on Ethiopia and Somalia to de-escalate tensions in a region that’s situated on the approach to a global shipping choke-point. https://bloom.bg/4aHMgm8

Capital shortage: Nigerian electricity companies are short of an estimated $2.5 billion in capital and need new investors to revive the industry that can barely supply power to its 200 million residents. https://bloom.bg/3S6r3uY

Prison release: Oscar Pistorius, the double-amputee South African Olympian athlete who murdered his girlfriend a decade ago, will be placed on parole from Friday. https://bloom.bg/3NSaX5r

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz

Huawei's new laptops stirred speculation China's SMIC achieved another chip breakthrough. A teardown shows that's not the case.

The Qingyun L540 notebook contains a 5-nanometer chip made by TSMC in 2020, around the time US sanctions cut off Huawei’s access to the chipmaker, research firm TechInsights found after dismantling the device for Bloomberg News.

That counters speculation that Huawei’s domestic chipmaking partner may have achieved a major leap in fabrication technique. More here: https://bloom.bg/3NNM5vG

📷: TechInsights

After a roller-coaster ride on the wealth rankings last year, Gautam Adani is back to being Asia’s wealthiest person days after India’s top court said no new probes were needed into Hindenburg Research’s bombshell allegations against the tycoon’s conglomerate.

Adani’s net worth rose $7.7 billion in a day to $97.6 billion, reclaiming the top spot in the region from Indian compatriot Mukesh Ambani, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries, was trailing by a narrow margin with a net worth of $97 billion, the index shows. More here: https://bloom.bg/3NTIbkZ

📷: Kobi Wolf/Bloomberg

Foreign exchange probe: Nigerian anti-graft officials visited offices controlled by billionaire Aliko Dangote as part of an ongoing probe into Godwin Emefiele, the former head of the country’s central bank. https://bloom.bg/3Hs0p9P

Senegal elections: A top court upheld the libel conviction of the country’s main opposition leader, Ousmane Sonko, dimming his chances of being able to run for president in elections next month. https://bloom.bg/3TNabue

Electricity czar powers: South Africa’s president approved an agreement giving Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa authority over the board and management of the state-owned power utility on ending blackouts. https://bloom.bg/41IZj2J

Watch Africa Amplified for a deep dive into the region’s biggest stories: https://bloom.bg/3u0S3Cz