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5 important things happening in South Africa today

Luke Fraser

 ·19 Jul 2023

Here’s what is happening in and affecting South Africa today:

• Positive for inflation: Statistics SA will release the Consumer Price Inflation (CPI) data for June later today, with analysts expecting it to return to the South African Reserve Bank’s target range of 3% to 6%. Chief Economist at Investec, Annabel Bishop, said CPI should hit 5.4% but warned that it would likely start ticking up after July due to base effects. Standard Bank Chief Economist Goolam Ballim said that the slowdown in CPI will likely lead to the Reserve Bank keeping interest rates on hold this week. [SABC News]

• Banking criticism: Minister for women, youth and people with disabilities Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma says South Africa is forced to kneel before the country’s big five banks and called for a new global financial system which would enable non-Western nations to plan their own developmental course. She said that the greater concentration of banking to the big five banks had undermined accountability, stalled development, suppressed competition and passed the cost burden onto consumers. She added that there is an urgent need to domesticate alternative banking. [Business Day]

• DStv looks for compromise: Multichoice CEO Calvo Mawela says the group is looking into a compromise that will allow concurrent streaming of DStv on more than one device. Although the decision to limit the number of devices that could watch live content on a single subscription was met with criticism last year, Mawela said that the move helped to boost subscriptions. However, the CEO said he was concerned that the group is struggling to retain subscribers in South Africa, which it attributes to load shedding and the country’s economic downturn. [Business Day]

• Another cold front: South African Weather Service (SAWS) says large parts of South Africa will experience a massive drop in temperature this week. The SAWS said that a cut-off low was expected to develop over the southern interior of the country today, with snow expected on the Cape Mountains. Overcast conditions will hit parts of five other provinces, including Gauteng, on Thursday. Last week, Eskom was forced to push South Africa into stage 6 load shedding following a dramatic increase in demand due to a cold front. [News24]

• Markets: The rand gained strongly on Tuesday, with Danny Greeff from ETM Analytics saying that the rand is overperforming, which he credits to its stretched undervaluation after a dismal year-to-date showing. He added that gold, platinum, and palladium markets have also made healthy gains, which provided further support. On Wednesday (18 July), the rand was trading at R17.88/$, R20.09/€, and R23.30/£. Brent crude is trading at $79.37 a barrel. [Nasdaq]