Asian markets were generally flat ahead of the JSE’s opening on Thursday morning, indicating a possibly lacklustre day for the local bourse, which managed a small gain of 0.22% on Wednesday.Naspers’s 31%-owned Tencent was down 0.37% to HK$376.60 in Hong Kong while BHP was up 0.27% to A$33.66 in Sydney.The rand was trading at R13.28 to the dollar on Thursday morning ahead of Reserve Bank governor Lesetja Kganyago’s interest rate announcement at 3pm.The rand was trading at R15.47 to the euro and R17.36 to the pound at 6.45am.The Reserve Bank’s seven-member monetary policy committee (MPC) is expected to vote to hold the repo rate at 6.5%. By convention, South African commercial banks add 350 basis points to the Reserve Bank’s repo rate to set the prime rate on which they base their home, car and other loans. If the Reserve Bank holds the repo rate at 6.5%, commercial banks will keep their prime rate unchanged at 10%."While we expect inflation to increase, we do not foresee a rise to ab...
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