About Mwangaza Yield

Why this exists

Kenya has one of the most accessible government securities markets in Africa. Since DhowCSD opened direct participation, anyone with a KRA PIN and KES 50,000 can lend to the government on the same terms as a bank. Yet the numbers that reach retail investors are almost never the numbers they will actually receive.

A bond advertised at a 16% coupon does not pay 16% if you buy it above par. A Treasury bill quoted at 8.80% earns more than that in true yield — then less than that after withholding tax. Two investors buying the same bond on the same day can end up with different net returns depending on tenor, because withholding tax is 10% above ten years and 15% below, and 0% on infrastructure bonds. None of this is secret. It is simply never calculated for the person doing the investing.

Mwangaza Yield calculates it. Every figure in this app is stated after tax.

The mark

The dhow is deliberate. It is the vessel of the East African coast, and the namesake of DhowCSD — the Central Bank platform this entire market now runs on. Its sail carries a rising yield curve, because the point of the boat is to take you somewhere. Treasury navy for the institution, sun gold for the light, emerald for growth.

What we are not

• We are not a broker. You cannot buy anything here — you bid on DhowCSD, directly with CBK, with no intermediary taking a cut.
• We are not licensed to give investment advice, and nothing here is a recommendation to buy or sell.
• We are not affiliated with the Central Bank of Kenya, the NSE, or the Capital Markets Authority.
• We do not want your money, your ID, or your account. There is no sign-up because there is nothing to sign up to.

How it is built

Everything runs in your browser. The financial engine — accrued interest, yield solving, withholding tax, ladder construction — is plain arithmetic executing on your device, tested against known values on every change. Market data is published as static files sourced from CBK, NSE and KNBS. Your portfolio lives in your phone's local storage and is never transmitted anywhere.

That architecture is a deliberate response to how people actually use phones in Kenya: the app installs to your home screen, works with no signal, and costs nothing to open. It is also why we can promise privacy without asking you to trust us — we could not read your data if we wanted to.

Get involved

The source is public on GitHub. Corrections to the maths or the data are especially welcome — see Support.