Already under pressure, the rand could be heading for more pain amid global risk-off sentiment as the US Federal Reserve continues with its strategy of gradual increases in rates, as it normalises monetary policy.The rand weakened to R13.3962 to the dollar on Wednesday, before recovering to R13.25, despite disappointing local retail sales data."The picture for the moment is not looking pretty," said TreasuryOne trader Andre Botha. He ascribed the bout of weakness to portfolio outflows, although he said the reason was "not clear-cut" regarding any decoupling of the rand from other emerging market currencies.June is expected to be an even weaker month for the rand than April, when it lost 5.42% to the dollar. It retreated a further 1.91% in May.Some analysts disregard local factors in explaining the rand weakness, citing global factors as the main reason. However, technical charts show the current rand weakness accelerated with the release of disappointing GDP data for the first quart...
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