JSE dips amid brewing trade war

The JSE ended the shortened week lower on Friday, as risk-off sentiment drove the bigger shares down amid concern about a global trade war.

The rand was firmer on a weaker dollar, providing support for banks, which ended flat. Local miners gained as investors piled into safe-haven assets. The property index suffered a sharp sell-off, as benchmark Growthpoint joined shares in the Resilient stable, which retreated further despite earlier announcing some structural changes to allay market concerns.

The gold index was higher, while retailers recovered towards the close.

Naspers dropped 4.55% to R3,150, ending the week 7.57% lower, its worst performance since early February. This followed a tumultuous week for the market heavyweight. Already under pressure from worse-thanexpected quarterly results from Chinese internet group Tencent, the group said it would sell 2% of its shareholding in Tencent. This surprised the market, as Tencent remains the biggest profit driver within Naspers.

The all share closed 1.43% lower at 56,405.60 points. The top 40 lost 1.51%. The property index lost 3.04%, industrials 1.94%, financials 1.19% and the platinum index 0.49%. The gold index rose 3.79%, food and drug retailers 0.48% and general retailers 0.32%.

British American Tobacco added 3.01% to R656.40, while Richemont fell 1.23% to R106.15. AngloGold Ashanti firmed 5.67% to R115.01 and Gold Fields 4.06% to R48.43. Old Mutual retreated 3.62% to R39.95.

The rand firmed to R11.7381 to the dollar from R11.8493 as downgrade concerns from ratings agency Moody’s Investors Service eased towards the JSE’s close.

Local bonds followed the firmer rand, with the yield on the R186 dropping below 8% to 7.985%. The R207 was bid at 6.68% from 6.69%.

Global bond trading was subdued after the sharp fall in US equity markets on Thursday amid concern about a growing global trade war between China and the US. The US 10-year treasury was steady at 2.8321% after yields fell earlier in the week following the US Federal Reserve’s less hawkish outlook for the rest of the year.

The top-40 Alsi futures index lost 1.15% to 50‚228 points. The number of contracts traded was 23,677 from Thursday’s 32,776.