Rand steady, US jobs data in focus

Johannesburg - The rand was steady against the dollar early on Friday, with investors cautious ahead of US jobs data which may support expectations of a rate hike by the Federal Reserve later this year.

The local unit largely brushed off domestic data that showed showing net gold and foreign exchange reserves rose to $41.934bn in April from $41.275bn in March.

At 10:20 the rand was trading at R12.0525/$, not far off its Thursday closing level of R12.0405.

"The rand is in a place where confidence in direction is low and positioning is possibly lower," said Warrick Butler, a currency trader at Standard Bank, in a market note.

"Today’s ever-important US payrolls data could be a watershed moment. A day of general malaise may be in order as the market awaits this afternoon’s data."

In fixed income, the yield for the 2026 benchmark was flat at 8.09%.