The market was down ¾ of a percent (but at least it was still higher for the week by 80bps). The biggest story of the day was the Rand which completely buckled after a story came out that two senior NEC members have spoken to Bloomberg anonymously saying that President Jacob Zuma will fire ministers that opposed him in 2016 – weak Rand = higher inflation, credit ratings downgrade and subsequent higher cost of borrowing money (and maybe even default on debt and recession). Liberty Holdings put out a trading update saying that earnings per share would be between 40-60% lower, the share fell over 10%. Comair, which is partly owned by Bidvest, released a voluntary statement saying that the increase in earnings per share was mainly due to the stronger Rand. The US GDP was weaker than expected at 1.9% (exp 2.2%), although they’ve had a fairly good earnings season.
