Skills of a good reserve bank governor

[#1]

...when you manage to have people feeling glad after half a % hike in rates.

[#2]

Makes you think why he has raise rates does it not ?

[Wizard]

He is just smoothening the crowd! Prevent riots. The real bad news will be in August. 1%!!!

[SimonPB]

wizard, I was right with the 50 this time and he will do 50 next time (if anything). Bottom line, he is not doing 100, not this cycle.

[Starsky]

This is like bazaaar trading: Price was R599 ; now R499. Everyone is happy.The trader getes more than he expected and the buyer thinks he paid less than he should.

[#6]

Tito must have been under incredible pressure from all fronts. The Economists on the one hand who for all intense and purposes have money to their name calling for a 1% increase or more and the poorer to middle class people represented by the likes of Cosatu etc calling on Tito to hold or drop interest rate. As the latter group are far greater in numbers I think Tito split his options and decided on 0.5%. In the medium term I think it just means we are going to plateau out for the next 6 months to a year. My long term view on the Repo Rate is still down. The Economy as a whole is under pressure and I can see there is cash flow problems amongst businesses. In my trade, Suppliers are scrambling for business and this may be a signal of a change in trend?

[platsak]

Credit to you Simon. You did call this one from the start.

[Shaun_Siddall]

Guys there is more to this, there will be an emergancy meeting once Eskom announces its increase, so all he has done is kept an easy 50pts in the bag. Very silly even mentioning 200pts and then 100pts and then raising it by 50pts it has killed the the currency and confidence from offshore which is so important - weaker rand = higher inflation. I wonder who advises him?

[CHATTYCHAT]

So, should Escom get his increase will TM hold back on the repo? An increase for Escom has a double purpose: (a) enhance inflationary pressures and (b) take money from the consumer's pocket. Tito wants to curb (a) by doing (b). The repo increase also guard the Rand against loss of value. OMIO

[Shaun_Siddall]

he will increase it again - and then the 13c drop in one second yesterday would never have happened if he had just raised it by 100pts the first time.