JSE a little higher as markets digest Cyril Ramaphosa’s new cabinet
The JSE opened higher on Thursday morning, getting a small boost from the announcement of the new cabinet on Wednesday night.
President Cyril Ramaphosa’s new cabinet has been cut from 36 ministers to 28, with Tito Mboweni retaining his position as finance minister.
Asian markets were under a little pressure, following losses in US markets on Tuesday, as the ongoing US-China trade war continues to weigh on sentiment. The Shanghai Composite earlier fell 0.31% and Japan’s Nikkei 1.21%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng had dropped 0.32%.
At 10.15am the all share was up 0.76% to 55,417.5 points led by banks, which rose 2.98% and financials 2.17%. The top 40 rose 0.82%. General retailers gained 1.32% and property 1.2%.
FirstRand climbed 3.36% to R66.15, Nedbank 3.22% to R258.62, Standard Bank 2.82% to R199.58 and Absa 2.61% to R166.79.
Discovery gained 3.25% to R143.12, Liberty 3.25% to R106.61. Sanlam rose 2.25% to R74.88 and Old Mutual 2.19% to R20.99.
Among diversified miners, Glencore fell 0.33% to R47.84, BHP 0.76% to R333.63 and Anglo American 0.24% to R354.80.
Nampak gained 1.56% to R10.41, despite the company reporting that its revenue was 4% lower to R8.5bn for the six months ended-March.
Life Healthcare fell 0.74% to R22.91, after the private healthcare operator said its interim profit after tax fell 46.9% to R498m in the six months ended-March.
Fortress’s B-shares gained 2.02% to R11.59. The property company said on Thursday that it had spent R438.2m on share buy-backs since the end of November 2018.
Producer price index (PPI) figures are expected to be released on Thursday morning. The US will release first-quarter GDP figures as well as jobless claims and consumption expenditure.
Source: businesslive.co.za
