{"id":167885,"date":"2017-04-03T12:10:59","date_gmt":"2017-04-03T10:10:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=167885"},"modified":"2017-04-03T12:10:59","modified_gmt":"2017-04-03T10:10:59","slug":"rand-slump-continues-ahead-of-credit-rating-review-on-friday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/finance\/167885\/rand-slump-continues-ahead-of-credit-rating-review-on-friday\/","title":{"rendered":"Rand slump continues ahead of credit rating review on Friday"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The rand continued its decline in trade on Monday (3 April) as political uncertainty underpins predictions for the week ahead &#8211; including a credit rating review on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>By 12h07 on Monday the rand lost 1.3% of its value against the greenback, trading at R13.59, having closed last week at R13.42.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Dollar\/Rand &#8211;\u00a0 down 1.30% to R13.59<\/li>\n<li>Pound\/Rand &#8211; down 1.16% to R17.00<\/li>\n<li>Euro\/Rand &#8211; down 1.36% to R14.50<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The rand has been in sharp decline since Zuma announced a cabinet reshuffle, which included the sacking of finance minister Pravin Gordhan and his deputy, Mcebisi Jonas.<\/p>\n<p>Uncertainty around the future of the National Treasury was not quelled following a press briefing by new minister of finance,\u00a0Malusi Gigaba, who signalled that he would implement &#8220;big changes&#8221; in the department.<\/p>\n<p>Chief among Gigaba&#8217;s priorities is overseeing the redistribution of wealth to the country&#8217;s black majority, stating outright that he will direct R500 billion to black-owned businesses, and the masses.<\/p>\n<p>Investors were rattled by president Zuma&#8217;s changes, with many analysts expecting the fallout to continue well beyond the initial reaction which has hit the rand and government bonds.<\/p>\n<p><a  data-lightbox=\"post-image\" href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/ZAR-USD-3-APR.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-167889 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/ZAR-USD-3-APR.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"638\" height=\"444\" srcset=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/ZAR-USD-3-APR.png 638w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/ZAR-USD-3-APR-300x209.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 638px) 100vw, 638px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Focus now turns to credit rating agencies, which are expected to deliver their reviews on South Africa in the coming weeks, with Moody&#8217;s first in line to deliver its report on Friday (7 April).<\/p>\n<p>Moody&#8217;s currently has South Africa at two notches above junk status, with expectations that the group will cut the country to one notch above junk.<\/p>\n<p>Two other agencies, however &#8211; S&amp;P Global and Fitch &#8211; have South Africa at one notch above junk, with the wide expectation that at least one (if not both) will cut South Africa&#8217;s sovereign debt rating to below investment grade, which will knock the rand yet again.<\/p>\n<p>Sub-investment grade countries suffer from having their borrowing costs spike significantly, while many international investors are blocked by policy from investing in such countries or from buying their debt.<\/p>\n<p>Predictions for where South Africa is headed post-Gordhan includes the country&#8217;s forecast GDP growth for the year dropping from a projected 1.1% to 0.2%, and for the rand to sink to R15.50 to the dollar as political instability builds ahead of the ANC&#8217;s elective conference in December.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read:\u00a0<a title=\"The plan to keep Zuma in office\" href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/167791\/the-plan-to-keep-zuma-in-office\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">The plan to keep Zuma in office<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The rand continued its decline on Monday as political uncertainty underpins predictions for the week ahead &#8211; including a credit rating review on Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":144519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11121],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-167885","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167885","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167885"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167885\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":167897,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167885\/revisions\/167897"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/144519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}