Money SA economy
The rand was range bound in morning play on Tuesday, tracking the euro in quiet trade, but around 4c weaker than levels seen in late trade on Monday.
At 9.01am the rand was bid at R7.67 to the dollar, R9.35 to the euro and R11.28 to the pound. The euro was bid at $1.2172 from $1.2214 overnight.
"It's quiet today, the rand is tracking the euro, we're looking at a range of 7.65-75 against the dollar," a local dealer said.
RMB analysts noted that the Euro/dollar did the running on Monday, making it all the way to 1.23 before Moody's fresh downgrade of Greece slowed the advance. "The rating agency's move is not unexpected and as such has probably only generated a blip in the rally rather than a change in direction," they said.
They added however, that a larger concern is Spain. "The country's problems are rather unique. Unusually, it was actually running good fiscal surpluses when the crisis struck and has an aggregate debt level way below the EU average. But its fiscal deficit has rapidly spiralled out of control and while its banks avoided the worst of the subprime problems, its smaller banks still need to face up to the country's housing bubble.”
Dow Jones Newswires reports that the euro's rally against the dollar and the yen ground to a halt in Asia on Tuesday after touching a one-and-a-half-week high against the greenback overnight, as selling by Japanese exporters overwhelmed short-covering by speculators.
