The following scheduled economic events, company announcements, equity and currency market moves may affect South African markets on Thursday.

ECONOMIC EVENTS

Consumer sentiment data

SOUTH AFRICAN MARKETS

South Africa’s rand rallied to its highest in more than 14 months on Wednesday, as improved risk appetite globally and positive local retail sales data supported demand for the currency.

The benchmark index ended up 1.1% to close the day at 67,812 points while the blue-chip index closed up 1.14% at 62,084 points.

GLOBAL MARKETS

Asian shares were on the backfoot on Thursday following mixed cues from Wall Street where a sharp sell-off in the largest bitcoin exchange Coinbase hit tech shares while the dollar index struggled near one-month lows.

WALL STREET

Wall Street indexes closed mixed on Wednesday, with the Nasdaq Composite and S&P 500 falling despite another record intraday high for the latter and big banks’ stellar results on the first day of earnings season.

GOLD

Gold prices edged higher on Thursday buoyed by a weaker dollar, while investors awaited U.S. weekly jobless claims and March retail sales data for further clarity on the recovery in the world’s largest economy.

EMERGING MARKETS

For the top emerging markets news, double click on

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Some of the main stories out in the South African press:

BUSINESS DAY

– Zuma ready to be a ‘prisoner of court’ after ignoring order to file affidavit

– Zweli Mkhize blames Big Pharma for vaccine delivery delays

FIN 24

– Smarter lockdowns, vaccines will see economy grow again – South Africa Reserve Bank

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