In September the average prudential balanced portfolio returned -1.59% (August: 1.86%). Top performer is EMH Prescient (-0.52%); while Stanlib (-2.43%) takes the bottom spot. For the 3 month period Metropolitan, takes top spot, outperforming the ‘average’ by roughly 1.5%. On the other end of the scale Stanlib underperformed the ‘average’ by 1.2%.

Do your grandmother and a burglar only still need cash?

This was the topic of the speech of Carsten Lange of Delta Secondary School who won this year’s German speakers’ competition held amongst various schools in Namibia. He went through various arguments for and against cash as legal tender. He correctly pointed out that internationally crime is generally not committed by means of cash and concluded in saying that for his part, he would like to continue being able using cash.

I am not sure whether this learner had had in mind Bank of Namibia’s declared intention of doing away with cheques when he prepared his talk. Fact of the matter is that internationally central banks are on a mission to do away with cash. Money laundering, crime in general and being in a better position to track the flow of moneys are the arguments used to push this down citizens’ throats. But is this the real reason behind efforts to do away with cash?