JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) -A recovery in the South African rand fizzled out on Tuesday, as the global market mood deteriorated over U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan.
Pelosi arrived on the island late on Tuesday, drawing an immediate backlash from China, which claims self-ruled Taiwan as its own.
At 1532 GMT, the rand traded at 16.6275 against the dollar, 0.65% weaker than its previous close.
The risk-sensitive rand is highly susceptible to shifts in global sentiment and is set to take cues from global drivers in the absence of major domestic economic data releases this week.
On Monday, it capitalised on dollar weakness linked to bets the Federal Reserve will slow the pace of its interest rates hikes.
Stocks on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) ended slightly lower as global markets continued to be on edge amid simmering tensions between U.S. and China.
Overall on the JSE, the benchmark all-share index closed 0.93% lower at 68,002 points, while the blue-chip index of top 40 companies ended 0.91% lower at 61,588 points.
The South African government’s benchmark 2030 bond jumped, with the yield down 13.5 basis points at 10.345%.
(Reporting by Alexander Winning and Bhargav Acharya; Editing by Shailesh Kuber and Krishna Chandra Eluri)
