{"id":832787,"date":"2025-07-24T08:50:03","date_gmt":"2025-07-24T06:50:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=832787"},"modified":"2025-07-24T08:50:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-24T06:50:10","slug":"big-shift-in-interest-rate-expectations-for-south-africa-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/finance\/832787\/big-shift-in-interest-rate-expectations-for-south-africa-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Big shift in interest rate expectations for South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

South Africa\u2019s tame inflation has created room for the central bank to cut interest rates at each of its three remaining meetings this year, according to Goldman Sachs and Investec Bank.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Annual inflation inched up<\/a> to 3% in June from 2.8% in May, data on Wednesday showed. That was less than the 3.1% median estimate of 12 economists in a Bloomberg survey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Inflation has now been below the 4.5% midpoint of the South African Reserve Bank\u2019s target range, where it prefers to anchor expectations, since August. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The central bank\u2019s benchmark rate is currently 7.25% and the monetary policy committee will announce its next rate decision on July 31.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Goldman Sachs sees the MPC lowering its policy benchmark rate by a cumulative 75 basis point to 6.5% by year-end if the central bank\u2019s inflation target is kept unchanged. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is in talks with National Treasury to have it adjusted lower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve pencilled in back-to-back cuts,\u201d Andrew Matheny, senior economist at Goldman Sachs, told Bloomberg. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Policymakers are likely to consider low price growth, declining\u00a0inflation expectations<\/a>\u00a0and the need to support the economy, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Growth has averaged less than 1% a year for more than a decade. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Investec\u2019s Chief Economist Annabel Bishop also believes there is scope for the MPC to reduce interest rates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additional cuts of at least 1% are warranted, given the neutral interest rate \u2014 where borrowing costs are neither stimulating nor weighing on the economy \u2014 is about 2% above inflation, and demand is weak, she said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe SARB has room to cut at each remaining meeting this year and should do so.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, Bishop warns that the MPC\u2019s caution may only yield one more cut this year. Either at the July MPC meeting, or later in the year and a further 25 basis point reduction next year, she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Capital Economics\u2019 David Omojomolo is bolder than Matheny and Bishop. He expects a 25 basis point cut to 7% at the MPC meeting next week and another 125 basis point reduction to 5.75% by end 2026, even if the inflation target is lowered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The central bank has reduced interest rates by 25 basis points at four of the last five meetings, pausing only in March when it cited uncertainty caused by US President Donald Trump\u2019s trade war. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Forecasting has become \u201ca nightmare\u201d, Governor Lesetja Kganyago said last week. \u201cThere are things that we are not sure about. We do not know in which direction they would go.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa\u2019s tame inflation has created room for the central bank to cut interest rates at each of its three remaining meetings this year, according to Goldman Sachs and Investec Bank.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":745523,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11121],"tags":[1999,2922,1498,3619],"class_list":["post-832787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","tag-goldman-sachs","tag-interest-rates","tag-investec","tag-sarb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/832787","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\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=832787"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/832787\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":832788,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/832787\/revisions\/832788"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/745523"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=832787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=832787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=832787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}