Satrix rakes in R13 billion, and Elon Musk’s Tesla-SpaceX super-merger on the cards
The rand was trading at R16.40 against the US dollar on the morning of Wednesday, 21 October 2026, unchanged from the morning before.
Local equities closed yesterday higher, with the JSE All Share Index gaining 1.29% yesterday while the Top 40 Index advanced 1.27%.
Investors await Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s Medium-Term Budget Speech, which is set to be delivered later today.
This will coincide with consumer inflation and retail sales data releases, with Reuters polling forecasting inflation of 4.7% for September.
Annual retail sales growth is expected to ease to 3.0% in August from July’s 3.4%, with rising fuel costs weighing on the economy.
On Wall Street, the Dow Jones rose 1.02% as the healthcare sector hit a record high, while the S&P 500 gained 0.28%.
The Nasdaq slipped 0.02% as technology shares weakened slightly due to concerns over AI development costs and financing requirements.
French political unrest kept European markets restrained, strengthening concerns of slow economic growth and rising government debt.
The STOXX 600 fell 0.14%, while the CAC 40 declined 0.38% and the FTSE 100 fell 0.29% as British wage growth accelerated.
Traders are pricing in an 85% chance for a European Central Bank rate hike in December, while expecting rates to remain unchanged this month.
In Asia, the Hang Seng was down 1.32% while the Nikkei 225 was down 1.30% as Japan reported September export growth of 16.7%.
This was below the 20.1% forecast and less than August’s 19.3%, despite rising semiconductor demand. South Korean exports increased 105.4% in the first 20 days of October.
In the commodities market, Brent crude oil rose back over $110 per barrel amid rising threats to shipping routes and Saudi infrastructure.
The price of gold declined on Tuesday to $4,115.16 per ounce, with investors weighing in on further Federal Reserve rate hikes.
On Wednesday morning, the rand was trading at R16.40 to the US dollar, R18.41 to the euro, and R21.94 to the British pound.
Important finance and investing news
Anthropic loses $80 billion in 6 months: AI giant Anthropic has disclosed a loss of R80.7 billion for the first six months of this year, compared to a net loss of just $13 billion over the same period a year prior. This comes as the San Francisco-based company prepares for an IPO that could value it at $2 trillion. [Wall Street Journal]
Satrix rakes in R13 billion: South Africa’s leading provider of index-tracking investment products brought in R13 billion in retail inflows in the first six months of the year, a quarter of the industry’s total retail inflows during that period. This has grown Satrix’s market share to 38%. [BusinessDay]
India’s biggest IPO ever: Jio Platforms’ $3.2 billion IPO was fully subscribed in less than 2 hours of public bidding. This is the largest IPO in India’s history and the first from billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance in two decades. More than 90% of Jio’s revenue comes from its telecoms business. [Reuters]
New tariff to save print industry: The International Trade Administration Commission has imposed a new 5% tariff on newsprint imports in a bid to save the domestic print industry. This follows a request from Sappi, which claimed cheap imports from countries like Canada had damaged its margins. [BusinessDay]
Tesla-SpaceX super-merger on the cards: Elon Musk has revealed that both Tesla and SpaceX have formed committees to discuss a potential merger, a move which the CEO who runs both companies believes has a lot of merit. According to Musk, no agreement has been reached, and there is no guarantee. [Wall Street Journal]
