Naspers lift boosts JSE resources

Johannesburg - Naspers [JSE:NPN] was the one of the few shining lights on the JSE on Wednesday morning, with the share price reaching yet another record.

The increase of 2.34% gave the Industrial index a lift and helped stem the negative influence of the tumbling resources sector, which was hammered by continued dollar strength.

READ: Dollar walks over global peers

By midday on Wednesday the All-share index was only 0.27% lower at 51 946, despite the resources sector slipping another 1.64% and the Gold sector losing 2%. The Top 40-index was also 0.22% softer, the Industrial index gained 0.26% and the Financial index was only 0.27% lower.

Naspers traded at R1 719.40 - which beats the previous record of R1 715 set last month - and earlier on Wednesday morning reached as high as R1 723.46.

There is no apparent reason for the increase as Tencent, its Chinese internet subsidiary, did not gain much on the Hong Kong stock exchange and there were no major corporate announcements.

A possible explanation is that Naspers could benefit from the weak rand, which traded as low as R12.37 to the dollar on Wednesday.