The rand was weaker in afternoon trade on Tuesday as the dollar gained on upbeat US retail sales data, with the market now pricing in a more hawkish stance from the US Federal Reserve, which may mean a further interest-rate increase in the US this year. US retail sales rose 0.6% in July from an expected 0.4%, the biggest increase in seven months. The dollar was already relatively well bid heading into the release of the data on some hawkish comments from Fed member, William Dudley, on Monday. While today’s report would likely increase the chances of another interest-rate increase this year, it was still far from being priced in by the markets, Oanda analyst Craig Erlam said, adding that the general trend of retail sales still remained worrying, despite the improvement over the past couple of months — and 2% inflation still looked a pipe dream. "That said, the dollar has been so heavily sold over the course of the year that even a slight unwinding of these trades could provide a near...
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