The country’s net reserves climbed in November, the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) said on Monday.
According to data released, gold and foreign exchange reserves rose to $39,587-billion at the end of November.
This was an increase from $38,784-billion in October.
Gross reserves came in at $40,489-billion for November — an increase from $39,788-billion the previous month.
Gold reserves rose by $509-million to $4,695-billion, the Reserve Bank said.
Commenting on the data, RMB currency analysts said while South Africa’s reserves rose strongly in November, this appeared to be mostly because of valuation effects rather than major reserve purchases.
”According to our calculations the SARB bought $100-million in the month, far smaller than the $500-million seen in October.
”This is somewhat surprising given that US dollar/rand traded below 7,40 for most of the month.”
RMB said its estimates were complicated by possible calculation problems that appear to have grown in recent months.
”The SARB merely releases the value of its reserves, broken into different components. They do not, however, specify how currency valuation effects adjust these values.”
Turning to net reserves which rose $800-million to $39,6-billion, RMB said it could calculate that $500-million of this was due to the rise in the gold price.
”We estimate that another $200-million or so came from currency valuation effects.
”There is, however, a degree of uncertainty over this figure.”
RMB said that usually the error could be ignored but in recent months, after doing these calculations, its figures had given surprising results that made it question the figures.
”For instance, they suggest that the SARB actually sold reserves earlier this year when the rand was already appreciating, bought in October but then withdrew from the market in November.
”If we take the November numbers at face value it appears that the SARB was not active in the market in the month.”
RMB said this was ”somewhat surprising”.
”As stated, the October figures did suggest they were buying again.
”We certainly don’t think that the SARB has been or will be very aggressive, but some small net purchases would seem normal given the rand strength and all their comments.”
RMB said the bottom line was still that the SARB might act to slow further rand appreciation but there was certainly nothing to suggest that the SARB would try to halt it. — Sapa