Johannesburg – South African bonds
firmed in afternoon trade on Monday on apparent US demand.
“Nothing much happened until 14:30
when the US joined the global bond market. I guess some US
institutions were short a bit of paper‚ but other than that there
was nothing to move the market‚” a local trader said.
At 15:53‚ the benchmark R157 bond was
trading at 5.640% from 5.690% at Friday’s close and Thursday’s
close of 5.655%‚ the R207 was bid at 6.735% and offered at 6.710%
from its previous close of 6.770% and the R186 was trading at 7.620%
from its previous close of 7.650%.
The rand was bid at R8.3135 per dollar
from R8.3127 at Friday’s close and Thursday’s close of R8.2198.
Dow Jones Newswires reported that crude
oil futures eased from overnight highs on Monday as uncertainty about
eurozone actions to strengthen struggling economies boosted the US
dollar.
Light‚ sweet crude for September
delivery was recently down 27 cents‚ or 0.3%‚ at $95.74 a barrel
on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude on ICE Futures
Europe rose 23 cents‚ or 0.2%‚ at $113.94 a barrel.
Oil futures reached a new three-month
intraday high in overnight trading after the German weekly Der
Spiegel reported that the European Central Bank (ECB) is considering
capping bond yields for fiscally frail eurozone member states.
However‚ the markets reversed course
when the Bundesbank‚ Germany's central bank‚ re-emphasised its
opposition to ECB bond-buying. The dollar rose against the euro‚
raising the cost of dollar-denominated oil for traders using other
currencies.
Meanwhile‚ Brent crude‚ the
European benchmark‚ is up after falling on Friday on news that some
countries were considering releasing oil stocks from reserves. After
failing to receive support from other nations or the International
Energy Agency‚ the US is now "much less likely" to tap
into its strategic petroleum reserve‚ said Commerzbank in a note.
Foreigners were net sellers of R2.332bn
of South African bonds including repo transactions on Friday after
net sales of R1.338bn of local bonds on Thursday‚ data released by
the JSE show.
Nominal cumulative volume was R48.893bn
on Friday from R86.888bn on Thursday.
Foreigners were net sellers of R2.117bn
of local bonds excluding repo transactions on Friday after net sales
of R665.289m of local bonds on Thursday.
For the year to date foreigners have
been net buyers of R63.112bn of local bonds‚ excluding repo
transactions. In 2011 they were net buyers of R47.359bn worth of
local bonds‚ excluding repo transactions.
In the year to date foreigners have
been net buyers of R62.218bn of local bonds including repo
transactions. In 2011 they bought R37.501bn worth of local bonds.