Johannesburg - The rand was back above the R10 per dollar level in early trade on Friday as the stronger dollar weighed on the currency. However, it was well off its overnight worst levels of around R10.27.
Currency markets are eyeing global stocks ahead of US data on Friday afternoon.
At 08:40 the rand was bid at R10.0920 to the dollar from a previous close of R10.2452. It was bid at R12.8526 to the euro from a previous R12.9921 and at R15.8077 against sterling from R15.9519 before.
The euro was bid at $1.2737 from $1.2678 overnight, while gold was quoted at $728.15 a troy ounce from $733.90/oz overnight.
RMB analysts said in their morning report that the Bank of England surprised investors yesterday by slashing rates by a massive 150bp, while the ECB opted for a more measured 50bp cut.
This, however, did little to lift the dark mood prevailing over financial markets, with most international equity
markets ending the day deeply in the red.
The dire economic situation was further underscored when the IMF released an emergency forecast update, predicting that the OECD economies are set to shrink by 0.3% in 2009 - the first time the world's wealthiest economies will have contracted since WWII.
The IMF also announced a further downward revision to its forecast for the global economy and is now expecting growth of just 2.2% in 2009.
"Weakness in both the GBP and EUR following the rate cuts saw the USD posting significant gains, which has put the rand under renewed pressure," they said.
Attention turned to stock reaction
Modest gains in Asian stocks this morning and a positive Dow Jones Futures Index point to a slight recovery in sentiment, which means there may be scope for the USD/ZAR to fall back below R10.00 this morning.
However, key US unemployment figures out this afternoon are likely to paint a bleak picture of the US jobs market which could see USD/ZAR heading higher towards R10.30 in the latter part of the day, they added.
Dow Jones Newswires report the dollar retraced its early losses and settled at overnight New York levels against the yen in Asia on Friday as players carried out their currency dealings based on the volatile moves of Japanese stock prices.
The dollar initially fell to ¥96.75 as the Nikkei 225 Stock Average fell by 7.1%. But it rose back by more than ¥1 as the Nikkei pared most of its earlier declines.
"Recently, there is no particular trend in the currency market," said Saburo Matsumoto, a senior dealer at Sumitomo Trust and Banking. "Players are just following stock moves as they are now seen as a yardstick of players' risk tolerance."
For now, players will turn their attention to stocks' reaction to the US non-farm payrolls data due later in the global day.
"If the data come in weak and hurt share prices, the dollar will likely fall," Matsumoto said.
A poll of economists surveyed by Dow Jones suggests jobs in the US declined by 200 000 in October. However, many players say the figure may turn out to be much worse.
The euro, meanwhile, rose against the dollar and yen as players adjusted their euro holdings ahead of the US jobs data release. But for the longer term, the euro will likely be the weakest of the primary currencies, some dealers noted.
Hiroshi Maeba, a senior dealer at Nomura Securities, said the euro will likely continue to fall as players will probably price in additional rate cuts by the BOE and the European Central Bank.
- I-Net Bridge