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Johannesburg - The JSE was firmer in noon trade on Thursday as commodity prices rebounded after slipping into reverse gear on Wednesday, triggering a major sell-off on global markets.
By 12:00 local time, the JSE all share index was up 0.47%, with resources adding 0.81% and industrials up 0.37%. Gold miners were up 0.20% but platinum miners were down 0.55%.
Banks were also weaker, by 0.41%, while financials were off 0.18%.
The rand was trading at 6.77 to the dollar from 6.72 at the JSE's close on Wednesday. Gold was quoted at US$1 377.28 a troy ounce from US$1 368.94/oz at the JSE's previous close, while platinum was at $1 736/oz from $1 713.50/oz before.
"We're witnessing a bit of a bounce after yesterday's sell-off which was caused by weaker commodity prices. Commodity prices are rebounding so our market is stronger with resources like your Anglos and Billitons supporting the bourse," a local equities trader said.
"But volumes are still subdued and the market is very quiet. We only expect things to start picking up from Monday when most of the players in the market will be back from their holidays," he added.
Dow Jones Newswires reports that European stocks pushed higher early Thursday as investors sought to add more risk to their investment portfolios amid better than expected economic data.
Lloyds Banking Group noted a sharp sell-off in US Treasurys Wednesday triggered by an upside surprise in US employment data and higher-than-expected ISM non-manufacturing figures for December. That money has now been fed into the equity market, the bank said.
"We would not be surprised to hear more market talk of possible Federal Reserve restraint in the execution of the current asset purchases program, which would contribute to bond weakness," said Lloyds. "The reaction, ahead of this Friday's payrolls data, seems to suggest a certain market eagerness to believe the reflation story."
In Asia, stock markets were mixed Thursday, although sentiment was supported by strong US private-sector jobs data Wednesday.
Japan's Nikkei Stock Average closed up 1.4% at a eight-month high, Australia's S&P/ASX 200 ends up 0.2% and South Korea's Kospi Composite was down 0.2%. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index was down 0.1%, Taiwan's main index was up 0.1%, while the Shanghai Composite index was lower by 0.5%.
Japanese stocks were also helped by the US dollar's surge against the yen on Wednesday. "The strong jobs data fueled expectations that the [US] nonfarm payrolls data to be released [Friday] may be strong as well," said Hideyuki Ishiguro, an investment strategy supervisor at Okasan Securities.
In the US Wednesday, stocks closed higher after fluctuating throughout the day amid the surprise jump in private-sector jobs and solid growth in the services sector.
