Oil Slips...
...and the Rand Claws Back Some Ground
Published 12 October 2026
What moved the Rand last week: the Rand against the US dollar, 5 to 9 October 2026.
What moved the Rand last week?
The Rand gained 20 cents against the US dollar in the week of 5 to 9 October 2026, closing at R16.51/$, its best week since early September. Oil sliding towards $100 a barrel lifted it to R16.48 on Tuesday, Hormuz worries pushed it back to R16.73 on Wednesday, and on Thursday Trump ruled out strikes on Iran before the midterms.
Well, last week the crowd was stampeding into the US dollar...
...and this week it ran out of puff.
The Rand made the most of it, fighting its way from R16.71/$ to R16.51/$ by the close in US trade – 20 cents stronger, and its best week since early September!
Not bad for a currency that spent five days trading like a barrel of oil.
Let's dig into it...
But first – the call we had out on Friday 2 October, before a single session had traded.
Our cycles had the US dollar pushing up into an R16.73–R16.97 area against the Rand, with an even chance of it topping out somewhere in there and turning lower. A break below R16.47 would prove us wrong.
USD/ZAR Short Term Outlook, issued Friday 2 October 2026.
Key Moments (5–9 October 2026)
Some of the more pertinent headlines and events over the past week:
⛽ Petrol Breaks R30 – A first at SA's inland pumps...and the marches started the same day.
🛢 Oil Can't Make Up Its Mind – And the Rand followed every twist...or did it?
🇿🇦 The SARB Isn't Done Yet – Its October review doesn't mince its words on oil.
🇺🇸 Fed Minutes Keep a Hike Alive – Most of the committee still wants one more.
💥 Washington Weighs More Strikes on Iran – But later that day, Trump had other ideas.
🤝 Trump Picks Up the Phone to Putin – And Russian diesel suddenly has somewhere to go.
🗣 "Get Out of the Kitchen" – Pretoria and the US ambassador trade blows in public.
The Rand opened Monday at R16.71/$, already almost 7 cents worse off than last Friday's close, and early that morning it slipped to R16.74...
...which turned out to be as bad as the whole week got.
From there it steadied, working its way back to R16.60 by lunchtime, before stalling in the afternoon. A US services survey showing prices still running hot gave it no reason to try again.
Tuesday belonged to the Rand.
When oil slid back towards $100 a barrel the Rand took off – 15 cents in about 5 hours, all the way to R16.48 by mid-afternoon!
The same day, the SARB's October Monetary Policy Review called the oil shock "massive and persistent" and warned about a wage-price spiral (not exactly the words of a bank that's finished hiking).
Wednesday was a different story, and the Rand spent the morning on the back foot, pushed out to R16.73 by early afternoon...
...as Hormuz flared up again and US 10-year yields hit their highest since 2002, giving the US dollar bulls a field day!
The Rand clawed some of that back by our close at R16.62/$. That evening, though, the Fed's minutes showed most of the committee still pencilling in another hike before the year is out.
And in other news...
Washington weighs more strikes on Iran. On Thursday the word was that Washington might hit Iran again before November's midterms, with Iran stepping up its attacks on tankers in Hormuz...
...and Brent jumped about 4% on the day.
Trump cuts a diesel deal with Putin. On Friday Trump gave Russian diesel the green light, waiving US sanctions on it until April 2027.
US diesel is sitting at around $6.28 a gallon (it hit a record $6.52 in September), and that with crude flows through Hormuz back at pre-war levels by the end of September – something even the mainstream press had to concede.
It's refined fuel that's in short supply, and Ukraine's drones pounding Russia's refineries are a big part of the reason.
Trump said last month that Zelensky had to "stop knocking out diesel fuel in Russia", and Zelensky's verdict on Friday's deal was blunt – "a weak decision by strong partners".
And who pays for diesel at those prices just weeks before the US midterms? The US electorate, at the ballot box...
...and I suspect there is more to this one than meets the eye.
SA petrol breaks R30 a litre. Saffers woke up on Wednesday to 95 unleaded at R30.25 a litre inland – up R3.33, and the first time ever above R30.
Cosatu marched across the country the same day, demanding fuel-price relief among other things...from a government led by its own alliance partner of 30-odd years. Make of that what you will!
The Bozell row comes home. Minister Lamola told the US ambassador to "get out of the kitchen"...
...and Bozell went straight onto American TV to accuse him of disrespecting Trump and Rubio – and to promise there was more where that came from.
Then Pretoria turned on its own. The chair of Parliament's international relations committee proposed a law to strip the citizenship of those spreading what he calls misinformation abroad – AfriForum, Solidarity, Lex Libertas and the FF Plus among them – and Lamola backed the call.
In other words, tell Washington about the SA government's socialist/communist agenda and you could lose your passport.
To get back to the Rand then, Thursday's strikes story had it stumbling out to R16.72 by mid-morning.
By late afternoon it had fought its way back to R16.56, only to be shoved back to R16.66 inside the hour – a proper whipsaw, which left it right back where Wednesday had left it.
Then, later on Thursday, Trump took strikes on Iran off the table until the midterms.
And the Rand?
It had already done its running overnight, waking up on Friday a good 9 cents better off than Thursday's SA close, and then sat tight all day (nobody wants to be caught on the wrong side of a Hormuz headline going into a weekend)...
...before finishing in US trade at R16.51/$ – its best close of the week!
Oil gave the market its excuse more often than not, but the reason goes back to last week, when the crowd piled into the greenback far and fast...
...and a crowd stretched that far needs very little to send it back the other way!
That's nearly half of last week's 29-cent slide won back in a week.
So what of the call we started with?
Just as per our forecast, early on Monday the US dollar pushed back up into our area, to R16.74...
...and that was the top of the week!
On Tuesday afternoon the Rand came within a whisker of R16.47, the line that would have proved us wrong, but never broke it.
Our latest update, out on Thursday night, still has the greenback with some unfinished business – as long as one key level holds (and no, I'm not giving that one away here).
Volatility and Risk Analysis
For those of you carrying US dollar exposures, here's what the week meant in Rand terms:
Open to Close Move: 20.44 cents
Risk per $1 Million Exposure: R204,400
Average Daily Range: 16.22 cents
Risk per $1 Million Exposure: R162,200
Maximum Single-Day Move: 21.92 cents, Wednesday's range
Risk per $1 Million Exposure: R219,200
Weekly Range: 26.50 cents, R16.48 low to R16.74 high
Risk per $1 Million Exposure: R265,000
That's the fifth-narrowest range of the 41 weeks we've had this year...
...but don't let that fool you into thinking the timing didn't matter!
An importer who bought at Wednesday afternoon's R16.73 paid 22 cents more on every US dollar than one who waited for Friday's close – R220,800 per $1 million.
The Week Ahead (12–16 October 2026)
SA: On Monday the 12th the ANC is expected in the ConCourt, trying to get 181 candidates back on the ballot after it never pressed "submit" in time (you couldn't make it up). Godongwana's Medium-Term Budget follows on Wednesday the 21st.
US: Monday is Columbus Day, so the US bond market is shut. September's inflation figure comes out on Wednesday the 14th, and producer prices on Thursday the 15th.
Global: Hormuz, and whether Trump's pause holds.
What to watch. Wednesday's US inflation number and the oil price will hand the market its triggers...
...but as always, it is the underlying cycles of sentiment that will decide the direction.
When the whole crowd is on one side of the boat, it doesn't take much to send them scrambling!
How did your Rand exposures fare? Just hit reply and let me know!
To your success~
James Paynter
P.S. The call this issue put to the test went out on the night of Friday 2 October, before the market had even opened – where we expected the move could run out, and the price that would prove us wrong. We've been doing that for 20+ years, across 8,672 scored Rand forecasts at 72.3% average accuracy. See the Strategic Rand forecasts
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