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Johannesburg - Stocks inched lower on Thursday, as a solid performance by furniture retailer Steinhoff International [JSE:SHF] was offset by a sharp fall in Vodacom [JSE:VOD] after Credit Suisse cut its rating on the mobile operator.
Steinhoff rose 2.2% to R53.80, helped by news that three of its directors - including one of South Africa's best known businessmen, retailing tycoon Christo Wiese - had increased their stakes in the company.
"When directors are dealing like that, in those big amounts - Christo's bought 1 million shares via single stock futures - it's generally a good sign," said Kyle Dutton, of brokerage Mercato Financial Services.
"It's going to give you a certain underpinning to a share price if someone like that is willing to put his money where his mouth is."
Shares of Vodacom, the top mobile operator in South Africa, fell 3.3% to R129.37 after Credit Suisse cut its rating on the stock to "underperform" from "outperform", saying tougher regulation could hit its business harder than that of rival MTN Group [JSE:MTN].
"Of the two mobile majors, Vodacom is proportionately more exposed to potentially negative South African regulation," Credit Suisse said.
MTN, which draws more of its revenue from Nigeria than South Africa, was little changed at R257.
South Africa's telecoms regulator has proposed cuts to the rates mobile operators can charge each other for using their networks - a negative for Vodacom, given that it has the biggest customer base in South Africa.
The benchmark Top-40 index fell 0.1% to 45 830. The broad All-Share index declined 0.06% to 51 230.
Volume was average, with 168 million shares changing hands, compared with the 20-day average of 163 million shares, according to Thomson Reuters data.
