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Brief note intended as a more regular interface with our clients. The emphasis is to provide our interpretation of important economic events, such as South African Reserve Bank interest rate statements, and key data releases, including GDP growth figures.
Although the end to the strikes will in itself lead to a big improvement in activity, the third quarter BER survey shows improvements in various other areas. However, the improvements are not widespread and modest. In most cases pre-strike levels of activity have not yet been matched. The rise in retail and wholesale confidence was much bigger than one would expect given underlying developments. The BER forecast provides for a recovery in consumer spending in the second half of the year. Until the surveys show more significant improvements in underlying developments – particularly the growth in the volume of food sales and employment – there is no need to revise this forecast upwards based on the survey results alone.
