Five months ago, Cell C launch a campaign whereby their subscribers could call for free from Cell C to Cell C on weekends. The marketing for this promotion was intense and many people went out to buy Cell C sim cards and start talking for ‘free’ on the weekends. But is the hype behind this campaign starting to wear thin? Read the rest of this entry »

Congratulations to South Africa for winning the Rugby World Cup in France on Saturday. It had been 12 years since South Africa had won the trophy and now finally it can return home. Can this victory have a positive influence on the country’s economy?

Many of us will be happy in the office today and through out the rest of the week and maybe for the rest of the year. The general positive atmosphere of the people in South Africa can hopefully lead to the people working harder as one tends to work well when they are in a happy mood. And all this can only bode well for the future. Read the rest of this entry »

The Rand Today would like to send a good luck message to the South Africa rugby team as they take part in the Rugby World Cup final this weekend against England in Paris.

We are fully behind and we know you are going to do us proud. We can expect not a lot of work to be done come Monday as I am sure the whole country will be in a celebratory mood. It will be interesting to see how the JSE reacts to a Springbok win. Can the Rugby World Cup have an effect on the South Africa economy?

After the interest rate increase last week, the Governor of the Reserve Bank, Tito Mboweni, came out yesterday and said that if people do not “feel the pinch in their pockets” they will not respond appropriately. He further stated that raising the repo rate last week was what the Reserve Bank thought was “good for the country” Read the rest of this entry »

The price of one barrel of oil reached $86 today, this after an announcement by Opec that crude oil production is slowing down in non-member countries. There are also growing fears that Turkish forces will pursue Kurdish rebels into Iraq and that could disturb oil supplies from the oil rich country. The middle east pumps a third of the worlds’ oil and supply disruptions there could easily impact the world oil price.

We have just had an interest rate increase in South Africa and do not be surprised if fuel prices go up again soon in South Africa due to the rise in oil prices.

As we had all thought here at The Rand Today, the Reserve Bank have raised interest rates again by another 50 basis points which means that the prime lending rate in South Africa is now 14%.

This is the highest the rate has been since September 2003. Prior to this announcement a few hours ago, many economists across the country thought that the Reserve Bank would not change the interest rates but I guess they were all wrong and are now in shock as most South Africans will be today. Read the rest of this entry »

Tomorrow (Thursday) we will all know whether the Reserve Bank hikes interest rates or not. On a poll conduct on this website, which ran for the last 6 weeks, 88% of you thought that the interest rates would go up again whilst only 12% thought they would not.

The Congress of SA Trade Unions (COSATU) came out yesterday and said that rising the interest rates would have a disastrous impact on South Africans. COSATU was appealing to the Reserve Bank not to raise interest rates tomorrow as they feel that a rise in interest rates will contribute to the slowing down of economic growth and thus of job creation and poverty alleviation.

I guess we all have to wait until tomorrow to find out what happens. But for now, please give us your thoughts about what you think will happen tomorrow.