The rand was softer shortly before midday on Monday, with all eyes on looming risk events, which should keep the local unit on the back foot.Market focus was dominated by the US Federal Reserve’s federal open market committee meeting, which ends on Wednesday with a media conference.Locally, ratings agency Moody’s is set to announce its latest stance on SA’s sovereign credit status, and should the agency downgrade SA, government bonds will fall off global bond indices.This week would be a reminder that global factors play a bigger role in South African asset prices than local factors, more so because the political dividend had now been priced in, said Rand Merchant Bank analysts. Recent local positive political developments should be enough to stave off a downgrade, and the market consensus was there would be no downgrade.Concerns about expropriation without compensation also hung over the market, and the longer uncertainty continued, the more likely it was that confidence would waiv...
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