Images like this seen on the left are being beamed across the world showing how bad the situation in Zimbabwe is. The local currency in Zimbabwe has become virtually worthless. The central bank in Zimbabwe continues to print more money and thus continuing to fuel inflation. It got to a stage where they deleted three zeros from the currency but that does not seem to have helped as the zeros continue to pile up. It is said that one US dollar will get you one billion Zimbabwe dollars. Now if you look at the image, there are a lot of $200 000 Zimbabwe dollar notes. In real terms, that one $200 000 note is only worth $0.0002 US dollars! No wonder it is being thrown in the bin. Read the rest of this entry »

The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) have decided to increase interest rates by 50 basis points. Reserve Bank governor, Tito Mboweni, made the announcement this afternoon. Some analysts had predicted a 100 basis point interest rate hike. The 50 basis point increase now means that the prime lending rate has gone up to 15.5% whilst the repo rate goes up to 12%.

Inflation continues to go up in South Africa largely due to the rising costs of food and energy. The world oil prices are rising almost every day and this plays a significant part in the local economy. Since the beginning of the year, the price of petrol has gone up by almost R2.50 a litre. One may say that the central banks high interest rate policy is working as car sales continue to drop as less people are able to purchase new vehicles and property prices are steadily dropping. Read the rest of this entry »

The all share indexed closed 1.31% lower today to reach the 30 639.950 point mark. This is the lowest the all share index has been since April this year. Analysts say the reason for todays drop was largely due to offshore fund selling ahead of the central banks decision on interest rates expected tomorrow (Thursday). All eyes on the market will be on Tito Mboweni to see if he increases interest rates and if so by how much. Many, including us at TheRandToday.com, predict interest rates to go up by 100 basis points.

Resources fell 1.80%, and the gold and platinum mining indices were down 2.82% and 1.92% respectively. Banks lost 0.88%, financials slumped 0.92% and industrials were 0.74% in the red. Read the rest of this entry »

The Rand continues to edge closer to the R8/$ mark. The local currencies demise in late trade yesterday was largely attributed to th US dollar gaining strength , weaker commodity prices and the downward turn in the JSE. The Rand had been hovering around the R7.94/$ mark most of the day but at 6pm yesterday; the rand was bid at R7.9599/$ from a previous close of R7.8795. It was bid at R12.3116/€ from a previous R12.3514 and at R15.5426/£ from R15.5563 before.

You can keep up to date with the latest rand rate by viewing the ‘Latest Rate’ graph on www.TheRandToday.com.

The R100m apartment at the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town has been bought by an unnamed buyer for R110 million. There are three of these luxury penthouses up for grabs at the one billion rand new development at the Waterfront which is due to be completed in October 2009. This R110m makes this penthouse the most expensive apartment in Africa. The developers, lead by tycoon, Sol Kerzner, believe that the other two penthouses will be sold very soon and both fetching amounts in the R110m region. Read the rest of this entry »

Most weekend papers ran with stories about how the tough times were now upon consumers in South Africa and that we should brace for the possibility of paying R16 for a litre of petrol in the near future. With the ever rising world oil prices the future is not looking great.

On Friday, the price of oil hit a record of almost $139 a barrel. Some analysts predict that the price could reach $150 as soon as July this year. The oil price continues to rise due to concerns of supply not meeting the demand and the continual political tension in the Middle East. With that said, there has been speculation that the price of oil could even reach the $200 mark by the end of this year. If the price reaches $200 a barrel then we could easily be paying R16 a litre by then. Read the rest of this entry »

You may be wondering what this all means. Most of us assume that the value of the Zimbabwe dollar is meaningless anyway but when some, thought that things could not get any worse for Zimbabwe, the worthless local currency continues to plummet to record low levels.

Today it has been reported that one US dollar will get you 1 billion Zimbabwe dollars! And this 1 billion dollar rate can fluctuate to as high as 1.45 billion depending on whether you are trading using cash. As cash has now become a very rare commodity in Zimbabwe, if you want to trade your foreign currency and you want cash back, you will pay a premium. Read the rest of this entry »