Wednesday 18th September 2013 : Taper day (or not)…8pm our time US markets gained again last night, with the S&P 500 up 0.4%, back over 1700. Microsoft raised its dividend by 22% and said it would buy up to $40bn of its shares. The share was up just 0.4%. European shares were down 0.5% and most Asian markets are down a bit, except Japan’s Nikkei, up 1.3%. The JSE ALSI did well yesterday, rising by 0.4% to 43,762, another record, as bank and retail shares gained another 1.5%. Foreign investors bought another R714m of our bonds and R752m of our equities yesterday. Interestingly, precious metal prices have taken a knock ahead of the taper announcement from the Fed today (less stimulus if there is a taper). Gold is at a 6-week low and platinum almost an 8-week low at $1417 ($1530 10 days ago). The good news is the oil price fell 2% yesterday and is now $108, down from $115 recently. Couple this with rand strength and the rand price of oil is down about 12% from its recent high. The rand is holding its gains at 9.81 to the dollar, 13.11 to the euro and 15.60 to the pound and the euro is still firm at $1.336 to the dollar.
Posted on: Wed, 18 Sep 2013 10:17:05 +0000
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