Johannesburg - The rand steadied against the dollar on Friday and was seen keeping in its recent trading range in the absence of key domestic data.
The rand was trading at R7.06 against the dollar at 06:34 GMT, not far from Thursday's close of R7.0635.
"It's still in the wide range of R6.95 to R7.15 and unless we get a close above or below that, it's going to stay in that band," said a local trader. "If the US GDP data disappoints this afternoon, you'll possibly see some dollar weakness."
There has been increased participation by the Reserve Bank in the market to try and cap rand gains, another trader said.
A break through R7.10 would indicate whether the rand could weaken further, and on the downside R7.00/dollar is the level to watch.
Government bonds firmed a bit after a sell-off this week, partly due to expectations of an interest rate rise towards the end of the year.