Rand is still stuck in a range

The rand was trapped in a range on Thursday midday, tracking the single currency's movement against the greenback.

At 11.49am local time the rand was bid at R7.25 to the dollar, R9.30 to the euro and R11.34 to the pound. The euro was bid at $1.2824 from $1.2852 overnight.

A local dealer said: "Every time we see the rand push up through R7.30/$, it comes back down again, and likewise for the low R7.20's/$. The range is R7.23-R7.33 until we get some kind of movement from the euro against the dollar. We were expecting the rand to weaken today, but the euro put some pressure on the dollar, staying above 1.28," he said.

Dow Jones Newswires reported German magazine Der Spiegel helped to crystallize market concerns about the Greek austerity package with an article warning that the measures are dragging the economy down, with unemployment rising to 70% in some parts of the country.

This came at a time when the market was already worried about the continued high cost of insuring Greek debt through credit default swaps, suggesting that investor confidence in the country's recovery from its sovereign debt problem is still at low levels.