Cape Town - The South African Reserve Bank (Sarb) is keeping its key lending rate at current four-decade lows, governor Gill Marcus announced on Thursday.
Interest rates will stay on hold at 5%, said Macus, who last cut the repo rate in July 2012.
The repo rate is the interest rate at which the Sarb lends money to commercial banks.
This was the final policy meeting for the year by the monetary policy committee (MPC).
Sarb is walking a tight rope as it balances the need to aid economic growth with trying to keep inflation within a 3-6% target band.
Last month Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan tabled his mini budget which as loaded with cost cutting measures.
He also revised growth prospects downwards to 2.1% of the gross domestic product (GDP) this year.
Marcus said the growth outlook remians fragile and the bank has revised 2013 GDP growth down to 1.9%.
"The headline inflation forecast of the bank is more or less unchanged since the previous meeting of the bank," said Marcus.
- Fin24
Interest rates will stay on hold at 5%, said Macus, who last cut the repo rate in July 2012.
The repo rate is the interest rate at which the Sarb lends money to commercial banks.
This was the final policy meeting for the year by the monetary policy committee (MPC).
Sarb is walking a tight rope as it balances the need to aid economic growth with trying to keep inflation within a 3-6% target band.
Last month Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan tabled his mini budget which as loaded with cost cutting measures.
He also revised growth prospects downwards to 2.1% of the gross domestic product (GDP) this year.
Marcus said the growth outlook remians fragile and the bank has revised 2013 GDP growth down to 1.9%.
"The headline inflation forecast of the bank is more or less unchanged since the previous meeting of the bank," said Marcus.
- Fin24