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/ 14 November 2003
Contrary to public pronouncements that the rand’s strength is almost exclusively due to United States dollar weakness, the move of the rand to its best trade-weighted level since July 18 2001 gives the lie to this reason. The trade-weighted rand has strengthened by a massive 26% since its worst level in January this year.
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/ 12 November 2003
The South African medium-term Budget policy statement was expected to cut the revenue and gross domestic growth forecast, and extend the foreign exchange amnesty beyond its current deadline of the end of this month — and this is exactly what happened.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=23450">Aids spending to reach R3bn</a>
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=23451">Mboweni: Budget won’t impact inflation</a>
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/ 27 October 2003
The New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad) will not succeed without sound, well-regulated financial markets, FirstRand Banking Group CEO Paul Harris said on Monday. "The African renaissance … won’t happen unless the continent develops its soft infrastructure," Harris said.
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/ 27 October 2003
South African Reserve Bank governor Tito Mboweni said on Monday that the bank has to be wary of changing its policy goals in response to changed circumstances. He once again emphasised that the overriding objective of the central bank is to achieve its CPIX inflation targets.
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/ 16 October 2003
South African Reserve Bank (SARB) governor Tito Mboweni said on Thursday that the central bank would cut the repo rate by 150 basis points to 8,5%, effective from October 17. Mboweni made the announcement at the end of a two-day meeting by the SARB’s monetary policy committee.
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/ 14 October 2003
Contrary to public perception, the rand is 1,9% weaker now than it was on September 4, the day before the surprise monetary policy committee (MPC) meeting for September 10 was announced. The popular perception is based on the move of the rand from R7,25 per dollar on September 4 to R7,04 per dollar today.
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/ 14 October 2003
Although the money market and capital markets are pricing in a 150 basis point cut on Thursday, an economist at Metropolitan Asset Managers said the South African Reserve Bank’s monetary policy committee should err on the side of caution. In particular, the economist was worried about the current account.
The South African Chamber of Business has called for a further 300 basis points cut in the prime interest rate by year-end to accelerate economic growth. "In my opinion, the correct level for the real prime rate is between 4% and 5%, so the Reserve Bank is lagging the decline in inflation," said a Sacob economist.
Although South Africa’s economic growth rate of an average of 2,8% per annum in the period 1994 to last year was more than twice that of the developed world’s 1,3% average, this high growth was not sufficient to address the high unemployment rate in South Africa, Finance Minister Trevor Manuel said on Monday evening.
Optimism on the impact of Aids on South Africa would be ”unconscionable”, according to the three authors of a World Bank study on the impact of Aids in the country.
Scientists meet on Aids strategies