Bonds doing relatively well despite lingering market uncertainty
SA bonds are firmer at midday but markets are eyeing the protests against Zuma; the rand is also faring better against the dollar than many other currencies
South African bonds were firmer on Wednesday before midday, doing relatively well despite lingering market uncertainty. Markets are keeping an eye on the opposition and civil society protest march at the Union Buildings in Pretoria where the call is for President Jacob Zuma to resign after his decision to reshuffle his Cabinet and fire Pravin Gordhan as finance minister. Nonetheless, bonds continued to fare well with the yield on the benchmark R186 succeeding at holding trades below 9%. The rand‚ which is also one of the key drivers in the bond market‚ fared a lot better against the dollar and other major currencies. Rand Merchant Bank analyst John Cairns said that overnight, markets returned to traditional safe-haven assets amid increasing geopolitical risks: "With this pullback in risky assets, we should see assets in SA trade slightly weaker today." At 11.36am, the bid on the R186 was at 8.86% from Tuesday’s 8.93% and the R207 was at 7.72% from 7.765%.
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