Johannesburg - The rand was largely flat for most of Friday's Johannesburg trade and worries over strikes in the mining sector are seen capping any significant gains.
The rand was at R8.6401/$ at 15:51 GMT, barely moved from Thursday's close at R8.6520/$.
"All of the big moves kind of already played out early into the European session ... and that's why you see the rand rather flat today," said Sean McCalgan, a market analyst at research house ETM.
The rand has pulled back significantly since hitting a 3-1/2 low of R8.9950/$ earlier this month when strikes in the mining and transport sectors spooked investors.
But as mine workers continue to square off against employers over pay, analysts believe the currency will struggle to gather enough momentum to move towards the 8.15/20 range that has been a key resistance area since July.
"I don't think there'll be a serious recovery even if we see positive news out of the mines because the negative impact has already played out and there's always potential for strikes to flare up again," McCalgan said.
Like the rand, government bonds also had a lackluster session on Friday, with the yield on the three-year benchmark dipping one basis point to 5.39% while the 14-year paper closed two basis points lower at 7.565%.