South African bonds weakened by between 35 and 50 basis points on Friday morning in the wake of a major Cabinet reshuffle that sent the country’s financial markets into a tailspin. The rand plummeted more than 6% from a best level of R12.79 to the dollar on Thursday to R13.6282/$ in opening trade on Friday on the news that finance minister Pravin Gordhan had been given his marching orders. The man who will be filling his shoes is former home affairs minister Malusi Gigaba, whose appointment has been met with some concern by market analysts. Nomura emerging-markets analyst Peter Attard Montalto said the market would struggle to digest the appointment of Gigaba, who had been effective at home affairs, but was "clearly being put in a role to do a particular job by Zuma and viewed as loyal to Zuma". "The market has been far too complacent that Zuma cannot remove Gordhan but he has now gone and done it and yet the market is still hanging onto the hope of a credible candidate, which has n...
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