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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2025
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disclosure’ RF and Simplified team ‘Full demanded over for $50m boost to SMEs deficit revisions By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
• Bond grows non-bank lender’s capital access RF Bank & Trust’s president yesterday said • 70% of first $10m drawn a Bahamian non-bank or in ‘the pipeline’ lender may require a further $10m-$15m drawdown from their $50m • Further $10m-$15m small business funding tie-up in as little as “three need in ‘3 to 6 months’ to six months”. Michael Anderson told Tribune Business that the investment bank’s financing partnership with Simplified Lending, the prominent non-bank and alternative financing institution, is designed to generate returns for his investor clients while simultaneously improving access to capital for the ultimate recipients of the funds - small and mediumsized Bahamian businesses (SMEs). He explained that the partnership, for which RF Bank & Trust has already
GERHARD BEUKES AND ROBERT PANTRY
placed and raised an initial $10m tranche out of a $50m bond facility, is designed to provide Simplified Lending with the capital it needs to fully fund job-creating expansion among Bahamian SMEs and, in so doing, accelerate the Bahamian economy’s growth and make it more resilient. Describing it as a structure where all participants win, Mr Anderson told this newspaper that if demand warranted - and key benchmarks such as Simplified Lending’s debt-to-equity ratios were in line - the bond facility could easily be expanded beyond its initial $50m size. Pointing out that the bond facility will enhance Simplified Lending’s access to funding that it can then “make available to its clients”, the RF Bank & Trust chief said the partners have already been
FINANCE - See Page B7
DIR chief: Reform to ‘rein in’ liquor industry ‘running wild’ By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net THE Department of Inland Revenue’s top official yesterday said she was “very surprised” that some liquor operators are backing reforms to “rein in” an industry that is “running wild”. Shunda Strachan, the tax agency’s controller, told a Zoom conference on the new liquor licensing/registration process that an “all hands on deck” approach involving the Bahamian public is vital to preventing the likes of bars, restaurants and nightclubs “popping
SHUNDA STRACHAN up all over the place” in residential areas and oversaturating communities. She reiterated that operators of so-called “cages”, where alcohol is sold from
CLEAN-UP - See Page B7
$80m Exuma project eyeing dredging, mooring changes By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net AN $80m resort residential project proposed for Exuma’s Stocking Island will require “limited dredging” and the potential relocation of some moorings in the Elizabeth Harbour Field. The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for the Exuma Fund 2 project, which does not disclose the beneficial owners, pledges that the 34.07 acre development - set to feature 38 residential homes and a 32-slip marina if approved - will create “at least 40 permanent construction jobs” with the developer planning to use more than “75 percent Bahamian labour
during both the construction and operation of the project”. The EIA, produced by Bahamian consultants Waypoint Consulting, added: “The proposed development is a resort residential subdivision complete with up to 38 residential homes, a 32-slip marina, private resident docks, moorings, back-of-house facilities, associated amenities and beach improvements. Backof-house operations will service waste management, electricity and potable water facilities. “The roll-on/roll-off ramp (RORO) requires some dredging for construction materials to land safely. Pending the conclusion of
MOORINGS - See Page B10
By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net THE Government must give “full disclosure” on the last-minute revisions to months’-old fiscal data that enabled it to almost hit its full-year deficit target, a senior banker urged yesterday. Gowon Bowe, Fidelity Bank (Bahamas) chief executive, told Tribune Business that the “positive news” generated by the modest $9.1m overshoot of the 2024-2025 deficit forecast will be undermined unless the Davis administration fully explains, and justifies, the removal of $37.3m from spending and deficits incurred between July and November 2024. Acknowledging that the revisions, first exposed by this newspaper, have “left significant uncertainties” over the “reliability and accuracy” of the Government’s financial figures and fiscal outcome, he warned that this threatens to leave
GOWON BOWE The Bahamas “bogged down in minutiae” and overshadow the recent credit rating upgrade by Standard & Poor’s (S&P). Calling on the Government to adopt private sector and public company disclosure standards, where financial statement changes are fully disclosed and explained, Mr Bowe told this newspaper that June 2025’s $25.4m surplus was “highly unusual” - and also warrants further explanation - because it is traditionally one of the
CONCERNS - See Page B9