{"id":32706,"date":"2026-04-22T10:50:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T08:50:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&p=32706"},"modified":"2026-04-22T10:50:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T08:50:23","slug":"rand-gains-ahead-of-domestic-inflation-retail-sales-data","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/rand-gains-ahead-of-domestic-inflation-retail-sales-data\/","title":{"rendered":"Rand gains ahead of domestic inflation, retail sales data"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The South African (SA) Rand gained in early trade on Wednesday after the United States (US) extended a ceasefire \u200bwith Iran, while domestically focused traders awaited the \u200crelease of data on inflation and retail sales.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The Rand traded at 16.45 against the Dollar, up around 0.5% \u200bafter trading in a narrow range during \u200bTuesday’s session.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Investors await the monthly Consumer Price Index \u2060and retail sales figures to gauge the health of Africa’s most \u200bindustrialised economy.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Economists polled by <\/span>Reuters\u00a0<\/i>estimate inflation will rise to 3.1% in March from 3.0% in the previous month, while retail sales\u00a0\u200bare expected to have increased 4.8% in February from 4.2%\u00a0\u200bin January.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The \u00a0Dollar was flat against a basket of currencies, \u200cwhile \u2060prices of gold, one of South Africa’s most valuable exports rose after US President Donald Trump said he would indefinitely extend the ceasefire with Iran to allow for further \u200bpeace talks, \u200bhours before it \u2060was set to expire.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Some safe-haven buying in the gold market followed Trump’s announcement \u200bbecause it appeared to be unilateral.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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It \u200bwas not \u2060immediately clear whether Iran or the US ally Israel would agree to extend the ceasefire, which began two \u2060weeks \u200bago.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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SA’s benchmark 2035 government bond \u200bwas slightly weaker in early deals, as the yield rose 1 \u200bbasis point to 8.45%.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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–Reuters–<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14374,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[44],"class_list":["post-32706","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-finance","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"","published_date":"","news_description":"Rand gained in early trade on Wednesday","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/32706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/32706\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32707,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/32706\/revisions\/32707"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14374"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=32706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}