Category Archives: kenyamoneyinthepast

Kenya’s Money in the Past: Old Books

I came across some old books this weekend; One was a collection of speeches by former Central Bank Governor, Philip Ndegwa, and the other was a collection of contributions made by MP JM Kariuki in parliament.

Philip Ndegwa

The Central Bank devaluing of Kenya’s shilling is not a bad thing, and the economic impact of this is widely misunderstood.
Commercial banks should be innovative and do more for rural Kenya; not just mop up their deposits, which they then only lend to businesses in urban areas.
Kenya’s population will double every 17 years if the current population growth rate remains at 4% a year (a speech he gave at a population conference in Nairobi).

JM Kariuki

There is a shortage of land for housing, and the government should take back all urban land that remains undeveloped for over two (2) years.
Why do government officers remove fences inside (colonial) farms that the government is buying to restore people? After this is done, the new owners will still have to go back and install new fences. Farms should be bought with the fence divisions intact.
While Kenya’s coin currency has the face of President Kenyatta, they should also inscribe his name around the sides so that future generations will know who the president was.

Kenya’s Money in the Past: Diners Finance

Found an annual report from Diners Finance from year 1989. Just 12 pages long, it ended in November as the institution commenced operations on 1 December 1988.

Other excerpts

Diners had Kshs 200 million in assets, fixed assets were 1.8 million (1%), advances (loans) were 25%, and liquid assets were Kshs 143 M(71%).
The assets included Kshs 15M million in cash, 104M on short call, 23 M in treasury bills and 49 M in advances (loans)
They had public deposits of 176 million from 674 depositors.
The deposits and total assets are listed month by month from December 1988 to November 1989
The profit before and after tax was Kshs 831,970. Elsewhere, there was a mention of Kshs 109,000 losses that were to be offset against future taxes
The directors were Alnoor Kassam (Chairman), and F. Levene who served from December 1988 till he resigned in March 1989, the same date on which A. Virjee was appointed. The secretary was Samvir management services. The accounts were audited by “Certified Public Accountants” and the audit cost Kshs 75,000. Elsewhere Peat Mawrwick are listed as the auditors.
In his printed comments, the chairman noted that this was their first year of operation, and a very competitive one… increased oil prices and falling coffee prices affected the level of credit available. the shilling also fell greatly and the government in a bid to control inflation and reduce the budget deficit, continued to issue treasury bonds in large quantities and at high interest rates that banks could not match – and this reduced the amount of money available to other sectors of the economy.
Central Bank allowed banks to charge up to 18% for lending over 3 years and up to 15.5% for loans with repayments of less than 3 years.
While commercial banks paid little or no interest to their current account holders, Diners was one of the first institutions to advertise in the media for individual depositors at attractive rates of interest. The incentive resulted in deposits of Kshs 170 million from 674 depositors ensuring a well-spread deposit base with an excellent foundation for Diners growth.
The book was designed and produced by ScanAd & Marketing and printed by Majestic.
in 1989, US$1 was ~Kshs 19

Kenya’s Money in the Past: EIU Prospects for 1990

Found this interesting booklet from the 1980’s. It’s out of print but glancing at some pages, it has some interesting perspective in terms of things to come (excerpts in italics):

Government Used to Love the World Bank and Hate the International Monetary Fund: (but) one result of the struggle with stabilization and structural adjustment has been a reversal of the government relations with the bank and the fund..Kenyan officials contemplate an application to the fund with reluctance, they regard negotiations as unnecessary taxing, tie up lots of top officials and are short-term in gains. Relations with the World Bank were preferred but now things are changing; (in 1983) the World Bank announced it was withholding the second tranche of its structural adjustment loan pending (the) fulfillment of conditions attached to the loan. At the same time the IMF singled out Kenya as an example of an economy where effective adjustment policies had brought down inflation and promoted economic growth, and an IMF Survey reported that Kenya’s efforts to reduce domestic and external imbalances (particularly under the current economic adjustment program), have met with considerable success.
Some Kenya Structural Adjustment Programs (SAP’s)

Top Technocrats speak the same language as the IMF: While relations with the World Bank are strained, those with the IMF have blossomed. New appointments have helped this including George Saitoti who replaced the unhappy Arthur Magugu as Finance Minister in 1983 and he called for larger IMF loans, moderation in import legislation and exchange rate flexibility. So does the governor of the Central Bank, Phillip Ndegwa, whose recent collection of papers includes one on the virtues of exchange rate fluctuation.
The tourism plans were considered ambitious: The target for 1988 was 724,000 tourists for 1988 (35% above the 1985 figure).
Oil Price Trends are in Kenya’s favour.
The Annual growth rate (target) for 1970 to 1983 was reduced from 6.3 to 5.4% since population growth was estimated (since the 1979 census) at 3.9%, not 3.5%
Fiscal & Monetary Reforms Proposed: Attempts to tighten control of government expenditure and reduce tax evasion would be accompanied by attempts to shift deficit financing from the CBK to commercial banks. There would also be an upward adjustment of interest rates to stimulate increased savings.

Kenya’s Money in the Past: M-Pesa Money Real Quick

This recently published book traces M-Pesa from its origins to the impact it has had on millions of Kenyan users. It has excerpts of interviews with insiders at Vodafone/Safaricom, Kenyan regulators, politicians, entrepreneurs, bankers, and dozens of other people, for who the service has had an impact on their lives.

While mobile money did not originate in Kenya, and the design of M-Pesa was not local, Kenya is the country that, for now, has extended mobile money far deeper than any country, and the book notes developments in other countries to emulate the success and scale of M-Pesa.

M-Pesa was the accidental outcome of a pilot project, but it is ultimately the end result of the hard work, partnerships (such as with Commercial Bank of Africa and DFID, but some broken at Faulu and Equity banks), funding, and decisions of some of the people interviewed.

It’s development process was not widely understood, nor was it universally popular, especially with bankers, who (like almost everyone else) did not forsee the ernomity of what M-Pesa would become in the lives of hithero unbanked Kenyans.

The book was completed in 2012, a few months before M-Pesa made a bigger foray into the world of banking when, Safaricom and Commercial Bank of Africa launched a SIM based bank account called M-Shwari.

Kenya’s Money in the Past V: Who Control’s Kenya Industry

Over the holidays, I came across a fascinating book on Kenya’s economic history that was published in 1968, as a report of a working party set up by the Department of Christian Education and Training of the National Christian Council of Kenya.

It’s a snapshot of another era when the East African Railways & Harbours was the largest commercial employer and the Kisumu Municipal Council was a milk processor. – and it shows early signs of conglomerates, and the influence of policy and politics that would shape Kenya’s industry in future years.

Some pages