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May 27 2012 11:21
There's a price war raging between South Africa's cellphone networks after Cell C lowered the rates of its prepaid calls by more than 34%.
May 28 2012 07:53
The City of Cape Town has spent R175m running the Myciti bus service since the Soccer World Cup compared to an income of R35m, a report says.
May 27 2012 13:09
The oversupply of golf estates has claimed another victim.
Johannesburg - The JSE's blue chip top-40 index of blue chips gained 1.43% to 20 946.42 points and the broader all-share index was up 1.33% to 23 166.38 points.
"We saw the non-farm payrolls come out better-than-expected in the US (but) as much as everyone is talking about green shoots coming through, I wouldn't be too sure," said Tim Harraway, a trader at Anglorand Securities.
"I personally don't think the worst is over ... After the run we had we definitely need a correction and we will probably see something like that next week."
The rand was trading at 8.04 against the dollar at 16:05, about 0.69% weaker than Thursday's New York close of 7.9850. It was off its session low of 8.1050.
"It's come off a little bit. We did see a brief rally to 7.97 after the (U.S. data) came out but that was short-lived ... so we consolidated after that," said Brigid Taylor, dealer at RMB.
"We are expecting next week to potentially open further downside the range at the moment is still 7.98 - 8.12."
Central bank data on Friday showed the central bank was using recent rand strength to buy dollars and build its reserves, raising speculation the bank was intervening to weaken the currency, after the rand firmed to a near-9-month high earlier this week.
On the bourse, diversified miners were the top gainers, boosted by a 6.10% rise to R200.50 in BHP Billiton after its one-time target Rio Tinto spurned $19.5bn of funding from China in favour of a cost-saving iron ore joint venture with it.
Anglo American rallied 5.13% to R236.76 despite lower base metal prices.
Gold miners dropped however, tracking a lower yellow metal prices with AngloGold Ashanti down 4.83% to R315. Gold Fields slumped 3.75% to R100 and Harmony stumbled 4.26% to R90.
Elsewhere, Anglo-South African insurer Old Mutual was 2.39% higher at R9.86, Investec gained 2.03% to R47.75 and Liberty International improved 3.85% to R54.
South Africa's government bonds were weaker, with the yield on the 2015 issue up 8.5 basis points to 8.435% and that on the 2036 paper up 7.5 basis points to 8.57%.
Market watchers 4CAST said in a note selling pressure on the bonds was pushing yields higher.
"Most (investors are) focusing on the positioning/supply story which will continue to make it hard for the market to rally... Many are not wanting to go into the weekend long."
- Reuters