JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa's rand gave up some ground against the dollar on Friday, largely reflecting a dip in investors' appetite for risk, while stocks fell across the board, tracking lower world markets.
At 1600 GMT the rand was trading at 7.5995 against the dollar, down 0.79 percent from Thursday's close of 7.54.
"We've basically seen a small sell-off in rand on the back of a little bit of risk aversion that we've seen in the last 2 days of trading," said RMB trader Brigid Taylor.
"We've seen stocks come off and we've also seen the dollar strengthen across the board against the currencies.
Trading had recently been marked by healthy risk appetite at the start of the week, which tended to taper off towards the end, Taylor said.
"I think as we start heading into the end of the year, we're going to see this kind of pattern become much more prominent as guys start to take back profits, especially with the significant (rand) rally we've seen this year," she added.
The central bank, finance ministry and trade unions have all warned the rand's gains of more than 20 percent against the dollar this year could hurt the economy, but the government has stressed it will stick to a free floating exchange rate.
The Johannesburg Top-40 index lost 0.47 percent to 24,338.36 points, while the broader All-Share index slipped 0.48 percent to 26,929.25 points.
"We are following world markets. I think we are also seeing some profit taking," Tubby Goodwin, a trader at Investec Securities said.
The Dow Jones Industrial was down 0.32 percent, while the FTSE 100 index was 0.12 percent lower, shortly after the Johanesburg bourse's close.
Africa's second-biggest grocery chain Pick 'N Pay was the biggest loser, shedding 2.74 percent to 39.81 rand, followed by insurer Sanlam, which slipped 2.48 percent to 21.59 rand.
Media company Avusa Ltd. dropped 7.51 percent to 16.01 rand, after posting a 60 percent fall in first-half profit.
But gold stocks bucked the downward trend on the market, with the JSE gold index up 1.5 percent.
Gold Fields gained 2.29 percent to 109.40 rand, while Anglo Gold and Harmony Gold rose 1.23 percent to 329 rand and 0.57 percent to 79 rand, respectively.
Traders said the weaker rand helped push resources higher.
African Bank was the top gainer, rising 2.48 percent to 29.35 rand, ahead of its full-year results on Monday. The bank has forecast a 10-12 percent slide in headline earnings per share.
Government bonds weakened on Friday, nudging yields higher.
The yield on the 2015 bond went up 6 basis points to 8.355 percent and that for the 2036 bond was up 11.5 basis points at 8.78 percent.
Source : http://af.reuters.com/article/investingNews/idAFJOE5AJ0NY20091120?sp=true
No comments:
Post a Comment