South Africa's rand steady vs dollar, power crunch eases

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - The rand held steady against the dollar early on Friday, supported by a slightly hawkish interest rate statement from the Reserve Bank and a slight improvement in the national electricity supply. The Reserve Bank, facing a dilemma from weak economic growth and heightened inflation risks, left the repo rate at 5 percent at its last policy meeting for 2013 on Thursday. However, Governor Gill Marcus said there had been discussions of hiking the benchmark lending rate. The rand gained and bond yields rose to over one-week highs. The currency was trading within that move on Friday, at 10.1400/dollar at 0649 GMT, from a 10.1265 close in New York. The rand has traded as strong as 10.05 this week, but needs to break through the psychologically key 10 rand level to open up substantial gains. "The rand has been holding steady this week but within this near-term corrective phase we believe that the risks are for a temporary leg lower in dollar/rand to 10.00 in the new week," said Judy Padayachee, a technical strategist at Absa Capital. Power utility Eskom said late on Thursday it would lift an "emergency" declared earlier in the week after the power supply became constrained. Fears of rolling blackouts tripped the rand nearly 1 percent against the dollar. Yields on government bonds were up half a basis point to 8.235 percent on the benchmark 2026 issue and 6.115 percent on the 2015 note.