Reserve Bank keeps repo rate unchanged
The South African Reserve Bank's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) has kept the repo rate unchanged at 6.5%.
The repo rate, which is the rate in which the central bank lends money to commercial banks, has remained at 6.5% since July.
This means the prime lending will remain at 10%.
The decision to keep rates steady comes in spite of consumer-price growth slowing to 3.7% in October, its lowest level in almost nine years.
Reserve Bank governor Lesetja Kganyago made the announcement in Pretoria on Thursday.
“The MPC welcomes the sustained moderation in inflation outcomes and inflation expectations and we would like to see inflation expectation anchored closer to the midpoint of the inflation target range on a sustained basis,” he said.
“Against this backdrop, the MPC decided to keep the repurchase rate unchanged at 6.5%.”
The central bank has also revised its economic growth forecast for 2019 down to 0.5% from 0.6%.
The forecasts for 2020 and 2021 have decreased to 1.4% from 1.5% and 1.7% from 1.8% respectively.