What's up on the JSE
Black Monday lingers.
From a South African perspective,
the rand and commodity prices
were the major casualties of the
bloody Monday of August 24 when
China’s stock market crashed.
It capped off a month of turmoil.
That day sliced 2.85% from the
all share index, but the trend had
been downward all month. But
others were worse off: London’s
FTSE 100 index tanked 4.7% and
Japan’s Nikkei 225 shed 4.6%, while
the US’s S&P 500 fell only 1.6%. In
other indices measured on these
pages, Brazil’s Bovespa index lost
3.0% and India’s Bombay index took
the biggest hit, losing 5.9%. Most
indices started recovering the next
day, with the JSE clawing back some
of its 10% fall for the month.
The real damage took place in the
currency and commodities markets
with both the rand and commodity
prices losing significant value off an
already low base. They had in fact
been shedding value since China’s
currency devaluation about a
fortnight earlier.
With China consuming 40% of
global base metals output and
a major consumer of other
commodities, things look bleak
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ISSUE 6 – SEPTEMBER 2015