Metal prices boost S.Africa's rand and stocks

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa's rand and stocks firmed on Wednesday, buoyed by stronger metal prices and rising risk appetite in global markets.

The Johannesburg Top-40 index gained 0.79 percent to 23,300.84 points, while the broader All-Share index added 0.66 percent to 25,924.50 points.

"Basically all the resources went up quite nicely because of the higher commodity prices. I think it's the major jump in the gold price and the platinum price," said Rigardt Maartens, a portfolio manager at PSG Online Securities.

The rand was trading at 7.6555 against the dollar at 1545 GMT, 2.35 percent firmer than its previous close of 7.84 on Tuesday in New York. It briefly touched 7.6550 earlier.

"Gold price is very firm, global stocks are higher and those are all the factors that are in play for the rand," said Ion de Vleeschauwer, chief dealer at Bidvest Bank.

Spot gold touched a record high of $1,095.05 on Wednesday as dollar weakness added to momentum lent to the market by India's purchase of 200 tonnes of gold from the IMF to push prices through key technical resistance levels.

After Monday's spike to 8.25/dollar that was largely attributed to a technical glitch, some dealers saw the rand sustainably trading above 8/dollar by the end of this week.

But market analysts 4CAST said if the current bullish trend holds "focus will switch to Friday's (firm level) at 7.6350 though it really needs to get back below 7.55 to reopen the earlier Oct (highs).

On the bourse, Harmony Gold powered 7.32 percent to 82 rand and Gold Fields climbed 5.91 percent to 107.50 rand. DRDGold and AngloGold jumped 6.01 percent to 494 rand and 4.08 percent to 315.26 rand, respectively.