JOHANNESBURG - The rand extended its fall on Thursday, tracking emerging market currencies as the Turkish lira dropped, and as traders remained cautious ahead of a Moody’s sovereign rating decision on Friday.The rand marked a third consecutive session of losses as sentiment toward emerging market currencies was hit by a 5% drop in the Turkish lira, a key proxy along with the rand for demand for high-yield currencies.
The lira’s slide overshadowed a decision by the South African Reserve Bank to keep its benchmark repo rate unchanged at 6.75% in a unanimous decision, saying the risks to the inflation outlook were “more or less evenly balanced”. Market focus was also on a sovereign rating by Moody’s scheduled for Friday. Moody’s is the only one of the “big three” agencies to rate South Africa at investment grade, with the sovereign rated “junk” by S&P Global Ratings and Fitch.
“It will be Moody’s decision that ultimately decides how next week’s price action will unfold,” said Investec in a note to clients.On the bourse, the Johannesburg All-Share index dipped 0.16% to 56,060 points, while the Johannesburg Top-40 index ticked up 0.01% to 49,903 points.Curbing further losses, Capitec Bank rose 3.86% to R1340.00 after reporting a 19% increase in annual profit on Thursday.
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