USD/ZAR
Talk of the week was undoubtedly the Fed’s Jackson Hole symposium, which produced the Federal Reserve’s aggressive new approach to increase employment and a resilience to inflation.
The Fed will seek 2% inflation on average, so that a balance is achieved between periods of extremely low inflation and higher levels – this in an effort to improve “economic recovery and job creation”.
Confusion still remains on how the outlined framework will be implemented as it was later said that “the new policy framework is not a commitment to future action”.

EUR/ZAR
The Euro traded in a 50c range this week with no clear trend, losing ground to it’s neighboring British Pound.
The Euro-zone saw some negative data come out in the form of Germany’s GDP contracting by 9.7%

GBP/ZAR
After the Jackson Hole Symposium’s talk, the Pound Sterling touched a high of the week for GBP/ZAR at around R22.60.
Versus the dollar, the Sterling saw a eight month high with an increase of 0.5% before then losing ground as the US Fed’s actions started to absorb in the market.

South African Rand
USD/ZAR did rally slightly after Powell’s anticipated speech, however the pair is still reasonably flat this morning.
Price action this week, as described by analysts, can be narrated as “buy the rumour, sell the fact”.
Talk is beginning to surface on the approach of Tito Mboweni’s mid-term budget in October, along with whispers of a looming financial crisis.
SA’s expenditure is currently gushing out R50 billion a month more than it is receiving in, causing pressure on the Finance Minister to cut spending – however the amounts we need to cut are almost three times more than has ever been reduced in our budget’s history.

Technically : Short term, we are seeing an important level manifest in the form of a resistance at R17.11/$ while R16.75/$ sits as the support on the bottom end.
Expected next high if we break the resistance may be a R17.20/$, while best buy lows are lined up at R16.70/$.