THE JSE’s insurers — which unlike its banks were left unscathed by the drama between Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan and the Hawks — may suffer on Wednesday.Santam expects to report basic and headline earnings for the six months to end-June fell as much as 31% due to drought-related claims in its crop insurance division and a few large corporate property claims.The JSE’s banking index fell a further 1.6% on Tuesday, taking its loss since August 18 to 9.6%. Banking shares have moved in tandem with the rand which has weakened from R13.25/$ on August 18 to about R14.50/$ on Thursday morning.Besides fears that President Jacob Zuma intends replacing Gordhan with a finance minister willing to drop Treasury investigations into various dodgy state-owned enterprise contracts, the rand has also suffered from expectations of US interest rate increases.Japan’s export-oriented manufacturers benefited from a weaker yen against the dollar, sending Tokyo’s Topix and Nikkei 225 indices both up about...
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