Image: Gallo

SA Reserve Bank Governor Gill Marcus

The presidency, the Ministry of Finance and the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) will make the announcement jointly at the SARB headquarters in Pretoria at 15:00 on Saturday.

President Jacob Zuma, Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan and the Governor of the SARB, Gill Marcus will all be in attendance.

Investec Economist Annabel Bishop says everyone in the markets is now left guessing as to what this means.

“The doors are wide open. One possibility is that the announcement could be a special SA contribution to the IMF to help it garner the additional US$500 billion it estimates it needs to put a firewall in place to prevent a collapse in market sentiment should Greece (or another euro member) default chaotically on its debt obligations or leave the euro.

“Other thoughts include major changes/restructuring to the management and/or operation of state bodies (such as the Reserve Bank or National Treasury) including the resignation of a leader of one of these institutions or even changes to economic policy or bank and/or financial regulation, although this seems unlikely, but the announcement is being made from the Reserve Bank.

“It may be something as simple as the date for budget day, February 22, 2012, being moved later in the month to potentially include some additional items, such as funding for SANRAL,” she said.

“If this latter is the case, or it is something else as simple as a date change, then too much market unease is being unnecessarily created over this announcement. Speculation is feeding off this mystery - already the rand has weakened to R7.73/US$ given that the announcement is being made out of market hours and so could be market sensitive,” she concluded.