JSE and global markets still going ‘BATS’

This week’s slide of global stocks — blamed on the emerging market “BATS” (Brazil, Argentina, Turkey and South Africa) — showed no sign of abating on Friday morning.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index was down 1.1%, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index was down 0.86%, with Naspers’s 31%-owned Tencent falling 1% to HK$311.40.

In Sydney, BHP was down 1.05% to A$31.07, contributing to a 0.62% drop in the ASX 200 index.

The rand was relatively calm at R15.34 to the dollar, R17.84 to the euro and R19.85 to the pound at 6.30am.

Miners African Rainbow Minerals and Northam Platinum are scheduled to release results on Friday.

African Rainbow Minerals, founded and chaired by Patrice Motsepe, said on August 22 it expected to report on Friday headline earnings per share (HEPS) for the year to end-June would grow by up to 54%.

The mining group said it benefited from higher commodity prices and a fair value of gain of R977m after restructuring its debt.

Northam said it expected to report its headline loss per share widened to between R1.86 and R2.16 during its 2018 financial year from the prior year’s R1.82.

Its production grew by 4.5% to 571,843oz despite work halting at its Booysendal mine in May when it took over operations from a contractor.

Rex Trueform and its holding company, African & Overseas Enterprises, said on August 31 they expected to report a more than tripling of HEPS for the 2018 financial year.

The owner of the Queenspark clothing chain said: “While the current economic trading and market conditions remain tough and are still likely to impact the business, particularly that of the retail segment, in the short term, new strategies implemented within the group, together with the containment of operating costs, have yielded results.”