Daily Report 14 February 2023

SA Company News:

The Johannesburg Stock Exchange All-Share Index closed 1% higher at the 79 770 level, mainly supported by technology and industrial shares.

Attacq shares gained more than 20% after it said that the company has entered into a transaction with the Government Employees Pension Fund (GEPF) to receive R2.8 billion in investments. The company said the proposed investment would help finance its Waterfall City development.

Italtile reported weaker earnings as consumers cut back on home improvements. The company said that trading profit down 8% to R1.4 billion, earnings per share down 5% to 79.5 cents and headline earnings per share down 6% to 79.2 cents. Italtile has declared an interim gross cash dividend for the period ended 31 December 2022 of 32 cents per share.

In a trading update from Curro, the company said that they expect headline earnings per share to rise by between 40.4% and 60.1% to between 0.574 cents to 0.655cents, from 0.409 cents in 2021, but estimated a potential decline in its earnings per share by 17.3% for the year. Curro is expected to publish its full-year results on the 2^nd of March.

 

SA Economy:

A report by the World Bank said that over the next five years SA is expected to show rapid growth in energy storage demand. The rise in demand will come from the transformation of the energy system to include more renewables and developing demand in the electric vehicle (EV) sector.

An economist from ABSA bank said that South Africa is likely to suffer two quarters of negative growth or a technical recession, amid the heightened power cuts that will affect the country’s near-term growth prospects and also place pressure on future tax revenue collection.

 

Global Economy:

The annual Consumer Price Inflation (CPI) in India increased to 6.52% in January 2023, the highest in three months, compared to 5.72% in December, and above market forecasts of 5.9%.

Investors are now looking ahead to the US inflation data due out later today, with expectations that inflation may have slowed from 6.5% to 6.2% in January.

The Baltic Exchange was up for the second day on Monday, rising about 2.3% to an over one-week high of 616 points.

 

Global Company:

European stock markets closed higher, but gains were limited as investors assessed the potential for further monetary policy tightening ahead of key U.S. inflation data due later today.

The FTSE 100 closed 0.82% higher at 7 947.

The Hang Seng Index is lower by 0.22% to 21 116, with weakness in healthcare shares, with Wuxi Biologics falling 5.3% and Alibaba Health Intl down 2.6%.

China’s video games regulator handed out publishing licenses to 87 online games, some of the games approved are owned by Tencent and Netease.

In China, the Shanghai Composite is down 0.13% to 3 279.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed 1.1% higher to 34 245, while the S&P 500 was up 1.813% to 4 137.

 

Commodities:

Gold is down 0.59% to $1 851.90/oz, while Platinum is higher by 0.81% to $953.30/oz.

Brent crude was 0.25% higher at $86.61 a barrel.

 

Currencies:

The rand traded at R17.85 against the US Dollar, R21.68 against British Pound and R19.17 against the Euro.

The Euro is slightly firmer against the US Dollar to trade at $1.0735.