November 2019

29 November 2019 – Annual producer price inflation fell to 3% in October from 4.1% in September, the sixth consecutive month of declines in the index.  The index, released by Statistic South Africa on Thursday, is a weighted index of prices that businesses charge at the wholesale or producer level for final manufactured goods. The […]

28 November 2019 – South African business confidence improved in the fourth quarter for the first time in almost two years, yet the economy remains stuck in a downward phase. A quarterly gauge measuring sentiment rose to 26 from a two-decade low of 21, FirstRand’s Rand Merchant Bank unit and Stellenbosch University’s Bureau for Economic Research said

27 November 2019 – South Africa‘s 2018/2019 maize crop is expected to be slightly higher than the previous estimate, boosted by higher yellow maize yields in the Free State and Mpumalanga provinces, the Crop Estimates Committee (CEC) said on Tuesday. The CEC, which gave its tenth and final estimate for the season, estimated maize production at

26 November 2019 – Federation of agricultural organisations AgriSA outlines a dire picture of the impact the years-long drought has had on South Africa’s farming industry and its now waning capacity to recover in the midst of a climatic shift. Over the past four years, the country has faced a drier climatic spell, leaving the

25 November 2019 – S&P Global Ratings changed its outlook on South Africa’s sovereign credit rating to negative on Friday evening, citing low GDP growth, rising fiscal deficits and a growing debt burden.  The rating agency did not downgrade SA further into junk, however. It warned that it may lower the rating if it observed continued fiscal

22 November 2019 – The South African Reserve Bank’s (SARB) monetary policy committee (MPC) on Thursday kept the repurchase rate (repo rate) unchanged at 6.5 percent. The prime lending rate remains at 10%. Most economists had expected the rate to remain steady, which means the prime lending rate will be unchanged at 10%. Making the

21 November 2019 – South Africa’s annual inflation rate dropped more than forecast to the lowest in almost nine years in October, providing some room for the central bank to ease policy. Consumer-price growth slowed to 3.7% compared with 4.1% in September, Pretoria-based Statistics South Africa said Wednesday in a statement on its website. The

20 November 2019 – The global economy may have narrowly avoided a recession, with most industrial and financial indicators pointing to a slight improvement in September-October after a sharp slowdown in the middle of the year. World trade volumes were down almost 1.5% in the three months from June to August compared with the same

19 November 2019 – The SA Reserve Bank is seen holding rates this week at the conclusion of its last scheduled Monetary Policy Committee meeting for 2019. Given anaemic economic growth, weak demand and low inflation, a minority of economists are making a case for a cut. The SA Reserve Bank (SARB) in the view

18 November 2019 – Trade conditions remained stable but subdued in October and are expected to continue as such for the next six months, the South African Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Sacci) said. Thought all components of trade conditions were on better levels than September, except for inventories and input cost, the trade index remained below