ABUJA, May 17 (Reuters)&nbsp;&#8211;&nbsp;Nigeria is monitoring Meta Platforms Inc&#8217;s&nbsp;FB.O&nbsp;Facebook and other platforms to ensure they comply with demands to curtail hate speech on their sites, as it steps up its campaign for responsible use of social media, Information Minister Lai Mohammed said on Tuesday.



Mohammed&#8217;s comments came after meeting with Facebook&#8217;s team in Nigeria&#8217;s capital, Abuja. He said Facebook had done nothing to curtail the activities of separatist group Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) on their platform despite several complaints.



Nnamdi Kanu, IPOB&#8217;s leader, is standing trial on charges that include terrorism and broadcasting falsehoods. A judge will decide on Wednesday on whether Kanu should be granted bail.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reutersconnect.com/all?search=all%3AL5N2W62BC&amp;linkedFromStory=true" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Read full story</a><a href="https://www.reutersconnect.com/all?search=all%3AL5N2W55OW&amp;linkedFromStory=true" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Read full story</a>



Mohammed said the separatist group has been classified as a terrorist organisation and that &#8220;Facebook has no justification for yielding its platform to the organisation to further its campaign of hate and destabilisation of the country&#8221;.



Nigeria is facing secessionist agitation which has given rise to regional calls for power-sharing between southern and northern Nigeria.



The country is also dealing with insecurity, banditry, kidnapping, a weak currency amid double-digit inflation and slow growth.



Mohammed said the Facebook meeting was called to discuss the increasing use of the social media platform by separatists based outside Nigeria to instigate violence and ethnic hatred in the country in English and local language.



He said the government has no intention of preventing Nigerians from using social media but is advocating responsible use.



Nigeria lifted a six-months ban on Twitter&nbsp;TWTR.N&nbsp;in January after the social media company removed a post from President Muhammadu Buhari that threatened to punish regional secessionists. Telecoms companies subsequently blocked access to users in Nigeria.<a href="https://www.reutersconnect.com/all?search=all%3AL2N2NM1P8&amp;linkedFromStory=true" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Read full story</a>



(Writing by Chijioke Ohuocha)

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Nigeria asks Facebook, other platforms to curtail hate speech￼

KEY POINTS



<ul><li>Twitter’s stock plummeted 18% in premarket trading following the initial announcement, but trimmed some losses after the second tweet.</li><li>Musk announced last month that he intends to buy Twitter for $44 billion.</li><li>He’s tweeted that one of his main priorities would be to remove “spam bots” from the platform.</li></ul>



<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/elon-musk/">Elon Musk</a>&nbsp;announced Friday that his&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/TWTR" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Twitter</a>&nbsp;deal is on hold until he receives more information about how many fake accounts there are on the social media platform.



In a follow-up tweet around two hours later, Musk added that he was “still committed to the acquisition.”



Twitter’s stock plummeted 18% in premarket trading following the initial announcement, but trimmed some losses after the second tweet. A spokesperson for the social media company did not immediately respond to a CNBC request for comment.



<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/TSLA" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Tesla</a>&nbsp;CEO Musk&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/14/elon-musk-offers-to-buy-twitter-for-54point20-a-share-saying-it-needs-to-be-transformed-as-private-company.html">announced last month</a>&nbsp;that he intends to buy Twitter for $44 billion and he’s previously tweeted that one of his main priorities would be to remove “spam bots” from the platform.



Even before Friday’s announcement, the company’s market value had fallen to&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/12/twitter-market-cap-has-dropped-to-9-billion-below-musk-purchase-price.html">$9 billion beneath the offer price due to concerns about the deal.</a>



Musk, who is <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/05/elon-musk-expected-to-serve-as-temporary-twitter-ceo-after-deal-closes.html">expected to serve as Twitter’s temporary CEO</a> if the deal goes ahead, would have to pay a $1 billion breakup fee should <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/26/elon-musk-will-owe-twitter-1-billion-if-he-cant-secure-financing.html">he choose to walk away</a>. Musk is worth more than $220 billion.



Twitter estimated in a filing earlier this month that fewer than 5% of its monetizable daily active users during the first quarter were bots or spam accounts.



Musk, who is the world’s richest person on paper, now wants the company to confirm this before he continues with the deal, which is being partly funded by Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison and venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz.



The San Francisco-headquartered social media company said in the filing that it had 229 million users in the first quarter who were served advertising.



On Tuesday,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/10/elon-musk-says-he-would-lift-twitter-ban-on-donald-trump-after-deal-closes.html">Musk said</a>&nbsp;that he would lift Twitter’s ban on former President&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/donald-trump/">Donald Trump</a>&nbsp;if he takes over the company.



“Permanent bans should be extremely rare and really reserved for accounts that are bots, or scam, spam accounts … I do think it was not correct to ban Donald Trump,” Musk said at&nbsp;<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/50d2861e-fdeb-487c-b052-f2021558e87d" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">FT Live’s Future of the Car conference</a>. “I think that was a mistake, because it alienated a large part of the country and did not ultimately result in Donald Trump not having a voice.”



Earlier this month,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/05/bill-gates-says-elon-musk-could-make-twitter-worse.html">Bill Gates warned</a>&nbsp;that Musk could make&nbsp;Twitter&nbsp;“worse.” Speaking at The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Summit, Gates said it’s unclear how Musk will change Twitter if he takes ownership, while also raising concerns about the spread of misinformation on social media platforms.



Gates went on to question what Musk’s goal is with Twitter and whether his drive to promote free speech is sensible. “What are his goals for what it ends up being? Does that match this idea of less extreme falsehoods spreading so quickly [and] weird conspiracy theories? Does he share that goal or not?” Gates said.



Before Musk made his bid to buy Twitter outright, he&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/04/elon-musk-thumbs-his-nose-at-the-sec-again-with-twitter-stake.html">failed to disclose</a>&nbsp;a more than 9% stake in the company within the SEC’s mandatory 10-day window.



<a href="https://www.theinformation.com/articles/elon-musks-early-twitter-purchase-under-ftc-scrutiny" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The Information reported</a>&nbsp;that the Federal Trade Commission is probing the timing of Musk’s disclosure.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-05-05/musk-faces-ftc-antitrust-review-on-twitter-alongside-stock-probe" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Bloomberg later said</a>&nbsp;the FTC is separately reviewing the acquisition itself, though many experts don’t expect the deal to raise antitrust concerns.



The FTC doesn’t disclose ongoing investigations, and an FTC spokesperson declined to comment.



Tesla’s share price climbed nearly 7% in premarket trading Friday.



Susannah Streeter, senior investment and markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said some are likely to query whether fake accounts are the real reason behind this delaying tactic.



“The $44 billion price tag is huge, and it may be a strategy to row back on the amount he is prepared to pay to acquire the platform,” she said in a statement.



Additional reporting by CNBC’s Lauren Feiner.

Elon Musk At SpaceX Headquarters

Elon Musk says Twitter deal on hold pending details on fake accounts; shares sink 11%

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CEO of Xcellon Capital Advisors Chamberlain Peterside says social media has evolved as a robust platform for domestic and international commerce, political interaction, citizens engagement, news and entertainment and cannot be easily censored or eradicated. He joins CNBC Africa to explore how Nigeria&#8217;s Twitter ban poses direct and indirect threats to its economic recovery efforts.

How Twitter ban poses threat to Nigeria’s economic recovery efforts

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Nigeria’s National Broadcasting Commission says it is unpatriotic for any broadcaster in Nigeria to continue to patronize Twitter as a source of information and User Generated Content. The broadcast regulator has called for broadcasting stations to suspend their twitter handles in compliance with the directive of the government to suspend the American microblogging platform. Barrister Valentine Utulu, Managing Partner at Legal Crest joins CNBC Africa for more.

Nigeria’s broadcast regulator asks media houses to suspend twitter handles

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The Nigerian government has suspended the operations of Twitter after the microblogging platform deleted a controversial post by President Muhammadu Buhari. Joining CNBC Africa to discuss the impact of this decision is Muda Yusuf, Director General of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Nigeria Twitter ban: Weighing the impact

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Twitter has opened its African Headquarters in Ghana. It is also the social media company’s first office on the continent.

Twiiter20

Twitter picks Ghana as its headquarters for Africa

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American rapper Jay Z and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey say they are establishing a Bitcoin Development Fund with 500 Bitcoin worth about $23 million to be jointly invested. In a series of tweets, Dorsey stated that they are taking applications for a blind irrevocable trust focused on Africa and India. This comes as Mastercard says it will allow select cryptocurrency transactions on its network later this year. Jake Bright, Writer and Advisor on African Tech joins CNBC Africa for more.

Jack Dorsey & Jay Z invest $23.6mn to fund Bitcoin development in Africa and India

(Reuters) &#8211; Twitter Inc said on Thursday it would label or remove misinformation aiming to undermine confidence in the U.S. election, including posts claiming victory before results have been certified or inciting unlawful conduct to prevent a peaceful transfer of power.FILE PHOTO: The Twitter App loads on an iPhone in this illustration photograph taken in Los Angeles, California, U.S., July 22, 2019. REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo/File Photo



Twitter said in a blog post it was updating its rules to recognize the changes in how people will vote in the Nov. 3 election and try to protect against voter suppression and misleading content on its platform.



The widespread use of mail ballots in the U.S. election due to the coronavirus pandemic will likely cause significant delays in tallying results, which some experts fear could allow misinformation to gain traction.



U.S. President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed, without evidence, that voting by mail is susceptible to large-scale fraud.



Twitter also said it would also label or remove misinformation creating confusion about the laws, regulations and officials involved in civic processes, as well as disputed claims that could undermine faith in the process, such as unverified information about vote tallying or election rigging.



A Twitter spokesman said whether content had specific falsehoods or could cause greater harm would determine if it would be removed, or labeled and have its reach reduced.



Social media companies have long been under pressure to combat misinformation after U.S. intelligence agencies determined Russia used their platforms to meddle in the 2016 vote, allegations that Moscow has denied.



The companies have also been under scrutiny over their responses to inflammatory content posted by President Trump. Since May, Twitter has attached warnings and fact-checking labels to Trump’s tweets about mail-in ballots.



Twitter said its rules would be “applied equally and judiciously for everyone.” The new policy, which is global, will take effect on Sept. 17.



Facebook Inc last week said it was creating a label for posts by candidates or campaigns that made premature claims of victory. It also said it would stop accepting new political ads in the week before Election Day.

What Twitter’s Big Hack Means For The 2020 Elections

Twitter expands misinformation rules ahead of U.S. election

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) &#8211; Twitter Inc (<a href="https://www.reuters.com/companies/TWTR.N">TWTR.N</a>) on Thursday reported its highest-ever yearly growth of daily users who can view ads, beating analysts’ estimates on usage and sending its shares up 4%.



Twitter’s average monetizable daily active users (mDAU) increased 34% year over year to 186 million, above analysts’ estimate of 176 million, in a rise it said was primarily driven by external factors such as shelter-in-place requirements and increased conversation around the COVID-19 pandemic.



But the company missed Wall Street’s lowered expectations for quarterly revenue, as the coronavirus-spurred economic slowdown battered the company’s largely events-oriented digital ads business.





Ad sales, which make up 82% of Twitter’s revenue, sank 23% to $562 million, a drop the company attributed to brand spending pauses tied to the pandemic and U.S. civil unrest. Analysts had expected $585 million, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.



Chief Executive Jack Dorsey opened a conference call with analysts by apologizing for the hack that compromised the accounts of high-profile users last week, saying “we feel terrible.” In a statement, Dorsey said Twitter had taken steps to improve its security and “resiliency against targeted social engineering attempts.”



Total revenue came in at $683 million, down 19% year-over-year, helped by steadier sales growth from the licensing of users’ posts to researchers and marketers.



Twitter has struggled to build out its ad offerings, leaving it reliant on a suite of promotional tools geared toward advertising around big events and product launches, which have all but vanished during the pandemic.



The company said it finished rebuilding its ad management technology in the second quarter, which would support faster development of new formats going forward, and was rolling out measurement tools for “direct response” ads used by app developers.



On the conference call, Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal declined to give details about the impact of a July social media advertising boycott that was intially focused on Facebook (<a href="https://www.reuters.com/companies/FB.O">FB.O</a>) but spread to other platforms. Dorsey said Twitter’s actions to protect conversations on the platform were being noted by advertisers.



Twitter also said it was exploring “subscriptions and other approaches to complement our advertising business,” such as commerce, though it was not expecting any revenue to result this year Dorsey said on the call that the company would have a “really high bar for when we would ask consumers to pay for aspects of Twitter.”



The company reported a second-quarter loss of $1.2 billion, largely driven by the reversal of a tax benefit established last year, when the company transferred intellectual property to Ireland. Because of the second quarter’s steep coronavirus-related losses, Twitter did not make enough money to take advantage of the tax benefit.



Adjusted to exclude the tax considerations, the company incurred a loss of $127 million, or 16 cents per share, roughly in line with analyst expectations of a $125 million loss. It had an adjusted profit last year of $37 million.



Echoing earlier guidance, Twitter said it expects data licensing revenue to “moderate” for the rest of the year.



Costs and expenses grew 5% to $807 million, below the increase in the low teens that Twitter had forecast. The company said it anticipated expense growth of 10% or more in the third quarter.



Social media rival Snap Inc (<a href="https://www.reuters.com/companies/SNAP.N">SNAP.N</a>) missed user growth estimates earlier this week, as its usage bump from coronavirus lockdowns petered out sooner than expected, but it beat targets for revenue gains.

wall street

Wall Street retweets: Twitter shares rise on record yearly growth in daily users

WASHINGTON (Reuters) &#8211; Twitter Inc disabled a campaign-style video that President Donald Trump retweeted on Saturday, citing a copyright complaint.



The video, which included music from the group Linkin Park, disappeared from the president’s Twitter feed late Saturday with the notification: “This media has been disabled in response to a report by the copyright owner.”



Twitter removed the video, which Trump had retweeted from White House social media director Dan Scavino, after it received a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice from Machine Shop Entertainment, according to a notice posted on the Lumen Database which collects requests for removal of online materials.



Machine Shop is a management company owned by the rock band Linkin Park, according to its LinkedIn page.



“We respond to valid copyright complaints sent to us by a copyright owner or their authorized representatives,” a Twitter representative said in an email statement.



The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.



Twitter began challenging Trump’s tweets in May and has repeatedly clashed with him since. The social media company has several times disabled or commented on tweets by the president because of what it said were copyright complaints or violations of a policy against threatening violence.



Twitter removed an image the president tweeted on June 30, which included a picture of Trump, because of a complaint from the New York Times, whose photographer had shot the image.



The company also put a tweet from the president behind a warning label in late May, saying that he had violated its rules against “glorifying violence” when he advocated that Minneapolis authorities be tough in responding to protests over the death of George Floyd.

gettyimages-642093036-594×594-2

Twitter disables Trump tweet over copyright complaint

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This morning, the world woke up to news that Twitter accounts of US prominent figures were targeted by Hackers, in a Bitcoin scam. The incident paints a very worrying picture concerning social media security. Joining CNBC Africa to discuss these security breaches in the technological space is Raj Wanniappa, CEO of Future Horizon Technologies.

How secure are your social media accounts?

JOHANNESBURG, 11 June 2020:- South Africa’s largest annual study of social media trends has revealed that Facebook remains the social platform of choice for marketing – but TikTok is rising fast among both brands and consumers. According to the 2020 edition of the SA Social Media Landscape, released this week by World Wide Worx and Ornico, almost a third of major brands intend to become active on TikTok, which is also the fastest growing social media platform among consumers. Fewer than 20% of brands have used it in the past year, but none believe they are doing so very effectively. These numbers are likely to change significantly during 2020. It is estimated that around 6-million South Africans are already using the platform. Nine out of ten major brands – just more than 89% – indicated they were active on Facebook, versus 77% on Twitter, 75% on LinkedIn and 68% on Instagram. “There was a common factor across all these platforms, however: a substantial drop in engagement from the previous year,” says Arthur Goldstuck, CEO of World Wide Worx and lead analyst on the project. “The one exception was LinkedIn, which saw a small increase in activity by major brands. LinkedIn also led the way in the proportion of older platforms that were intending to use it for the first time in the coming year: a large 21%. One could argue that LinkedIn is a social platform whose time has come.” Not surprisingly, lack of budget has emerged as the single most significant barrier to implementing social media strategies. A massive 18% are not allocating budget to social media, compared to only 1% last year. While Facebook remains the dominant platform among both brands and consumers, it has lost some appeal in terms of marketing budgets. “Facebook spend has plateaued,” says Oresti Patricios, CEO of Ornico. “This signals how brands are looking at prioritising their budgets across platforms, which can also talk to where brands look to increase their communication.” Patricios believes TikTok is set for explosive growth. “Launched in China in 2016, TikTok is seen as the new kid on the block in South Africa which marketers and communicators are scrambling to understand.” Goldstuck agrees: “The popularity of social media environments for brands has in the past been shown to be directly related to the level of usage of those platforms by marketers. Hence, TikTok is almost non-existent among big brands, as the marketers behind those brands are not active on TikTok.” Twitter and Instagram both showed strong growth in the past year, each reaching a user base of about 9-million. Data analysed for the SA Social Media Landscape 2020 report from the Target Group Index (TGI), a research survey among 30,000 South Africans coducted by Ask Afrika, shows that just over half of Instagram and Twitter users – 4,7-million on each – are highly active on these platforms. Contrary to the view that Twitter is primarily a vehicle for negative sentiment, data on all South African tweets over a 12 month period, provided for the project by audience intelligence company Brandwatch, shows a different picture. Of the tweets reflecting sentiment, 61% comprise positive sentiments, against 39% negative.  However, it is clear that even 39% remains a high proportion, and generates significant shade over the Twitter landscape in general.

Facebook holds on as TikTok invades Social Media in SA

Report by Catherine Clifford



Twitter and Square co-founder and CEO <a href="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/news/2020/04/08/twitter-ceo-jack-dorsey-pledges-1-billion-of-square-stake-for-covid-19-relief-efforts/">Jack Dorsey</a> is worth $4.9 billion, according to Forbes.



But the 43-year-old college drop-out says he plans to give away all of his money within his lifetime.



Why?&nbsp;



“I live by the principle of everything is connected, so if someone is in pain, I’m in pain, ultimately, over time,” Dorsey told former Democratic presidential hopeful and universal basic income advocate Andrew Yang on an episode of the “Yang Speaks” podcast published Thursday.



“I want to make sure that I’m doing whatever I can in my lifetime to help that through my companies’ works, through my own personal giving,” Dorsey told Yang.&nbsp;



On April 7, pledged (on Twitter, of course) to transfer $1 billion worth of his shares of Square to fund a combination of <a href="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/videos/2020/05/21/covid-19-working-from-home-presents-new-cyber-security-challenges-for-firms/">Covid-19</a> relief efforts, universal basic income and support for girls’ health and education. At the time, that was approximately 28% of his net worth.



<figure class="wp-block-embed-twitter wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">I’m moving $1B of my Square equity (~28% of my wealth) to <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/startsmall?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#startsmall</a> LLC to fund global COVID-19 relief. After we disarm this pandemic, the focus will shift to girl’s health and education, and UBI. It will operate transparently, all flows tracked here: <a href="https://t.co/hVkUczDQmz">https://t.co/hVkUczDQmz</a>&mdash; jack (@jack) <a href="https://twitter.com/jack/status/1247616214769086465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 7, 2020</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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“I’m in a situation that I never imagined when I was a kid or [even] when I was 25,” Dorsey told Yang. “I didn’t have any aspect of what money would mean until I was, probably 35.” (Dorsey’s first appearance on the Forbes billionaires list was in 2012.) 



“I’m so grateful, but part of gratitude is not just saying I’m grateful, it’s doing,” Dorsey told Yang.&nbsp;



For Dorsey, that means giving his money to worthy causes.&nbsp;



“I want to give out all my money in my lifetime. I want to see the impacts, selfishly, in my lifetime,” Dorsey told Yang. “I want to make sure that we’re helping people.”



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Dorsey is publicly tracking his $1 billion donation via a Google Document. Because the contribution is in stock and the value of the stock has increased, the donation is currently worth more than $1.5 billion, according to the Google Doc. So far, $200 million of the stock has been liquidated into cash for dispersal, Dorsey said.



As of Thursday, Dorsey has distributed a bit more than $85 million, according to the Google Doc.



The unconventional tech billionaire did not want to start a foundation because he doesn’t want to pay the overhead expenses involved with running a philanthropic organization, he told Yang.&nbsp;



Giving away his money feels good, Dorsey says, in the same way that creating Twitter and Square and seeing the tech tools being used for the first time feels good.



“When you build something like a Twitter or Square, the greatest value is actually seeing someone else use it. That’s what drives us. It feels electric,” Dorsey said. “The first time we saw tweets from Iran, it felt electric. It felt amazing.” And it felt just as amazing when his mom texted him to tell him that the coffee shop she goes to in St. Louis had started using Square.



“That electricity that I feel in those moments is the same that I’m feeling right now when I give and when I know that these organizations that we’re giving to are focused on real impact and doing things that are bigger than all of us and especially me,” Dorsey told Yang.&nbsp;



One of those organizations is Yang’s. Dorsey dispersed $5 million to Yang’s Humanity Forward initiative, an organization which advocates for the benefits of universal basic income. That money will be given in $250 microgrants to those in need, Yang said.



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<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">Here’s our podcast talking about it and a few other things: <a href="https://t.co/x90i2I89No">https://t.co/x90i2I89No</a>&mdash; jack (@jack) <a href="https://twitter.com/jack/status/1263459839360897024?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 21, 2020</a></blockquote><script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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This article was first published on CNBC Make It <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/21/twitter-ceo-jack-dorsey-on-giving-away-his-billions.html">https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/21/twitter-ceo-jack-dorsey-on-giving-away-his-billions.html</a> and is republished with its permission.



For more coverage on COVID-19 visit: <a href="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/covid-19/">https://www.cnbcafrica.com/covid-19/</a>

Billionaire Bill Gates: 6 movies and TV shows to help relieve pandemic stress

Here’s why Twitter billionaire Jack Dorsey wants to give all his money away

(Reuters) &#8211; Twitter Inc (<a href="https://www.reuters.com/companies/TWTR.N">TWTR.N</a>) Chief Executive Officer Jack Dorsey on Tuesday pledged $1 billion of his stake in Square Inc (<a href="https://www.reuters.com/companies/SQ.N">SQ.N</a>), the payments processor that he co-founded and heads, to help fund relief efforts related to the coronavirus pandemic.



In a series of tweets, Dorsey said the amount, representing about 28% of his wealth, will be donated to his charity fund, Start Small LLC, which would later focus its attention to universal basic income and girls’ health and education.



Dorsey, who for years has kept details of his charitable efforts private, said all donations to and from the fund would now be visible to the public at all times through a public document.



Dorsey, whose net worth is estimated at $3.3 billion by Forbes, also said that he was pledging his stake in Square instead of Twitter because he owns a bigger portion of the payments processor.



He also said that he would pace the sale of the pledged shares over time.



The United States has recorded more than 380,000 coronavirus cases, with the total death toll rising to about 12,300.



(Reporting by Shariq Khan in Bengaluru; Editing by Anil D&#8217;Silva)



This article was first published on Reuters <a href="https://reut.rs/3c0AUKL">https://reut.rs/3c0AUKL</a> and is republished with its permission.



For more coverage on COVID-19 visit: <a href="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/covid-19/">https://www.cnbcafrica.com/covid-19/</a>

COVID-19: South Africa eases lockdown to revive battered economy

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey pledges $1 billion of Square stake for COVID-19 relief efforts

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CNBC International looked at the reason behind why the African continent is fast becoming the latest tech hotspot for some of the world’s biggest names such as Jack Dorsey the founder of Twitter and Elon Musk the CEO of Tesla.

Africa: The untapped world leading tech hotspots

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Last month it was announced that Jumia was suspending their food delivery services here in Rwanda, the news came amidst reports that the Pan-African e-commerce company had already shut down operations in several other African countries, including Cameroon and Tanzania, but to customers here in Kigali, the news was still quite surprising. The service had become a mainstay in many city dwellers&#8217; lunch and dinner plans and the outcry was heard on Twitter. Enter, Vuba Vuba – a new company by former Jumia Rwanda Managing Director, Albert Munyabugingo, plans to pick up where Jumia Food left off. He joins CNBC Africa for more.

Exit Jumia Food

Exit Jumia Food, enter Vuba Vuba – MD Albert Munyabugingo on how new food delivery service plans to cater to Rwandan market

By <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/kate-rooney/">Kate Rooney</a> <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://twitter.com/Kr00ney" target="_blank">@KR00NEY</a> 





KEY POINTS



<ul><li>The Square and Twitter CEO says he plans on spending up to six months in Africa and that “Africa will define the future.”</li><li>Microsoft, Facebook and Google are all involved in the continent with accelerator programs — Visa, Mastercard and Salesforce are making venture investments in African start-ups.</li><li>Early Facebook investor Jim Breyer says Africa “presents some fundamental leapfrog opportunities” that have been unlocked through the rise in mobile phones and other platforms.</li></ul>



Jack Dorsey is in good company when it comes to Africa.



The CEO of <a class="" href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=TWTR">Twitter</a> and <a class="" href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=SQ">Square</a> <a class="" href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/02/jack-dorseys-move-to-africa-raises-questions-for-investors.html">announced</a> in November that he would spend up to six months in the continent in 2020, with few specifics. But he’s one of dozens of U.S. CEOs and global venture capital investors seeing potential for technology disruption — and returns — throughout the continent.



“We’re seeing a lot of the investment opportunity and growth happening in the tech sector,” said Witney Schneidman, a Brookings fellow with the Africa Growth Initiative and former deputy secretary of state Clinton administration.



“Jack Dorsey is in the right place at the right time and investing the appropriate amount of time to begin to understand the complexity of the African market.”



<figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://twitter.com/jack"><img decoding="async" src="https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/1115644092329758721/AFjOr-K8_normal.jpg" alt=""/></a></figure>



<a href="https://twitter.com/jack">jack&nbsp;✔@jack</a><a href="https://twitter.com/jack/status/1199774792917929984"></a>



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img decoding="async" src="https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/72x72/1f30d.png" alt="🌍"/></figure>



Sad to be leaving the continent…for now. Africa will define the future (especially the bitcoin one!). Not sure where yet, but I’ll be living here for 3-6 months mid 2020. Grateful I was able to experience a small part. 



<figure class="wp-block-image"><a href="https://twitter.com/jack/status/1199774792917929984/photo/1"><img decoding="async" src="https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EKZ0osqXYAcLsMk?format=jpg&amp;name=small" alt="View image on Twitter"/></a></figure>







Africa has a young and booming population, which Schneidman said makes it a “natural market for any tech entrepreneur.” The 54 countries in Africa have a combined population of 1.3 billion people with an average age of 19, and more than half of global population growth over the next 30 years will happen there, according to a recent UN report. Africa also has the largest population of underbanked and unbanked people in the world, making it appealing for companies in financial tech and payments.



Jim Breyer, an early Facebook investor and partner at Accel Partners, likened the investment opportunity to China in the early 2000s. Breyer, who’s now the founder of Breyer Capital and Co-Chairman of IDG Capital based in Beijing, said promising businesses in Africa haven’t necessarily invented something new — they’re finding “novel ways to leverage technology.”



“Africa similarly presents some fundamental leapfrog opportunities that have been unlocked through the use of mobile phones and other technology platforms,” said Breyer. “We’re seeing some of the smartest individuals from top academic institutions in the U.S. and elsewhere return to the African continent, thereby contributing to a growing talent pool of entrepreneurs and developers.”



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<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Venture bets</h2>



Major tech companies are taking notice and have launched start-up accelerator program to help get more companies off the ground.&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=MSFT" class="">Microsoft</a>&nbsp;said in May that it will spend $100 million over five years on its first African development center, starting in Kenya and Nigeria.&nbsp;<a href="https://cchubnigeria.com/fbstart/" class="" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">Facebook</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=GOOGL" class="">Google</a>&nbsp;both have African accelerator&nbsp;<a href="https://developers.google.com/community/launchpad/accelerators" class="" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">programs</a>&nbsp;for local start-ups.



Chinese conglomerate Alibaba has a similar&nbsp;<a href="https://www.alibabacloud.com/startup" class="" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">program</a>. In December, Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma published an&nbsp;<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/05/opinion/jack-ma-africa-digital-economy.html" class="" rel="noreferrer noopener" target="_blank">op-ed</a>&nbsp;in the New York Times outlining the “next digital revolution” driven by African entrepreneurs.



Some companies are going the venture capital route and placing strategic investments in African start-ups. Visa, for example, announced a 20% stake in African consumer-payments product PalmPay.



Online payment processor Flutterwave, based in Lagos and San Francisco, is another popular bet. It has partnerships with&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=UBER" class="">Uber</a>&nbsp;and Alipay and has raised money from&nbsp;<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=CRM" class="">Salesforce</a>&nbsp;Ventures, Mastercard, and Google Developers Launchpad, among others, according to Pitchbook.



Breyer backed Ghanian healthcare company mPharma in 2017, which earlier this year acquired Kenya’s second-largest pharmacy chain. He has also backed e-commerce company Sokowatch, Africa Health Holdings, Jetstream, and Apollo Agriculture.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading">Infrastructure opportunity</h2>



Part of the opportunity is a lack of existing, legacy systems. Ben Lynett, another early investor in Sokowatch and founder of Lynett Capital, said that’s often an opportunity, not an obstacle.



“What we’re now seeing is missing infrastructure that tech can solve,” said Lynett, who began investing in Africa in 2016. “You have a lack of infrastructure and a potential leap-frog effect where things haven’t been build, but 2019 technology can come in and figure out what makes sense and apply it in a unique way.”



Valuations are also more “reasonable,” Lynett said. Of the more than 400 start-ups worth $1 billion or more only two are based in Africa, according to CB Insights.



Chinese venture investors have been upping their bets in the region. Two Nigerian fintech firms — Opay and PalmPay — raised more than $220 million from Chinese venture capital investors in the fourth quarter of 2019.



With those opportunities come headwinds. Lynett said scaling and finding enough technology-focused talent can be a challenge. Brookings’ Schneidman said knowing the rules and “ensuring the rules are consistent” across the 54 countries in Africa “can be a challenge” as well as finding local partners in that market can also be a headwind. But as valuations skyrocket in the U.S., there may be increased interest abroad.



“The venture capital world and Africa are still working hard to find each other,” he said. “The returns aren’t what investors are used to in the U.S. and Western Europe so we don’t see a flood at this point — but we do see people who understand the market.”



This article first appeared on CNBC <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/30/jack-dorsey-follows-tech-companies-investors-in-africa-interest.html">https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/30/jack-dorsey-follows-tech-companies-investors-in-africa-interest.html</a> and is republished with its permission

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